Abstract
In manufacturing supply chains with labour-intensive operations and processes, individuals perform various types of manual tasks and quality checks. These operations and processes embrace engagement with various forms of paperwork, regulation obligations and external agreements between multiple stakeholders. Such manual activities can increase human error and near misses, which may ultimately lead to a lack of productivity and performance. In this paper, a multi-agent cyber-physical system (CPS) architecture with radio frequency identification (RFID) technology is presented to assist inter-layer interactions between different manufacturing phases on the shop floor and external interactions with other stakeholders within a supply chain. A dynamic simulation model in the AnyLogic software is developed to implement the CPS-RFID solution by using the agent-based technique. A case study from cryogenic warehousing in cell and gene therapy has been chosen to test the validity of the presented CPS-RFID architecture. The analyses of the simulation results show improvement in efficiency and productivity, in terms of resource time-in-system.
Highlights
Over the last decade, the deployment of radio frequency identification (RFID) within different supply chains has had a major influence on the traceability of materials and information
This paper extends the application of agent-based approach and proposes a multi-agent cyber-physical system (CPS) architecture for complex manufacturing and supply chain systems with embedded RFID technology
Real data on the RFID cycle times for a five-week period were collected from the shop floor of the case study company
Summary
The deployment of radio frequency identification (RFID) within different supply chains has had a major influence on the traceability of materials and information. In many small and medium enterprises (SMEs), the application of automated techniques such as IoT, CPS and RFID is not mature and is at the early stages of proof-of-concept Such advancements create new challenges for industries in terms of uncertainty management [7], security [8], cloud computing [9] and big data management [10], evaluating the impact of such technologies on supply chains’ and businesses’ performance is crucial for any investment appraisal. This study contributes to knowledge by extending the application of ABM technique to develop a multi-agent architecture for an RFID-CPS. This is followed by a case-study in a cryogenic supply chain .
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