Quantum computing is expected to have transformative influences on many domains, but its practical deployments on industry problems are underexplored. We focus on applying quantum computing to operations management problems in industry, and in particular, supply chain management. Many problems in supply chain management involve large state and action spaces and pose computational challenges on classic computers. We develop a quantized policy iteration algorithm to solve an inventory control problem and demonstrative its effectiveness. We also discuss in-depth the hardware requirements and potential challenges on implementing this quantum algorithm in the near term. Our simulations and experiments are powered by \texttt{IBM Qiskit} and the \texttt{qBraid} system.
翻译:量子计算预计将对许多领域产生变革性影响,但对工业问题的实际部署没有得到充分探讨。我们注重将量子计算应用于工业的业务管理问题,特别是供应链管理。供应链管理的许多问题涉及巨大的州和行动空间,给经典计算机带来计算挑战。我们开发了量化的政策转换算法,以解决库存控制问题并展示其有效性。我们还深入讨论了近期内实施量子算法的硬件要求和潜在挑战。我们的模拟和实验由\ textt{IBM Qiskit} 和\ textt{qBraid}系统驱动。