Kanban System Research Articles

Using a kanban system for multi-echelon inventory management: the case of pharmaceutical supply chains

Using a kanban system for multi-echelon inventory management: the case of pharmaceutical supply chains

Lean Production on Chili Pepper Supply Chain Using Value Stream Mapping

In the globalization economic development, most of industries have been developing strategies to improve efficiency in their production processes. Meanwhile, chili pepper supply chain is still not aware about efficiency and effectiveness in its management. Most actors in chili pepper supply chain face several obstacles, i.e. losses, waste products, and inefficiency in delivery time. This research is focused on the development of chili pepper supply chain performance using Value Stream Mapping (VSM) analysis and aims to create a new key system to develop efficiency and effectiveness. VSM is used as an instrument to enhance comparative advantage in wildly industries. VSM in chili pepper involves operation system such as 6S, Volkswagen production system, visual workplace, quick changeover system, and Hiejunka Kanban system. Those techniques are applied to reduce waste in chili pepper supply chain. The research result shows that chilli pepper supply chain should explore the implementation of VSM.

Improving Work System by Reducing Setup Time Activity in Drying Room in Pharmaceutical Industry with Single Minutes Exchange Die (SMED)

<p>Pharmaceutical industry especially that move in generic products, have many kinds of products to be manufactured in its production lines with the shortest possible time. This condition causes the frequent of changeover process. This cause requires the company to further improve the effectiveness of the machine by reducing the time of changeover process in terms of setup and clean-up machine. In order to reducing the time of setup and clean-up activity use the method of approaches the SMED analysis method to reduce unnecessary motion waste (value added and non-value added derived from lean manufacturing). Before conduct the research, in the 5th production line was not in the Kanban system. So, it often occurs the changeover process. The longest changeover time is in the drying room. After that conduct the Time and Motion Study in order to know the detail setup activities in the drying room. This is due to problems in the working methods and environment factors. Based on data from observations made on the engine FBD, there are 49 activities comprising 44 internal activities and 5 activities that can be converted to an external. Then from 44 internal activities, only 43 were able to be combined activity of up to 11 activities. Results from this study is able to decrease setup time and clean-up on the machine FBD by 62.18%. Based on this result also, this can increase the productivity of the production line.<br />Keywords: Unnecessary motion waste, Lean Manufacturing, Value added, Non-value added, Changeover process, SMED.</p>

Adaptive smart card-based pull control systems in context-aware manufacturing systems: Training a neural network through multi-objective simulation optimization

Nowadays, context aware manufacturing systems offer interesting capabilities to improve the performance of pull controlled production systems. Smart Kanbans can be used instead of physical cards, and the information become available about the production context, collected for example through sensors and RFID. Such information can be exploited by intelligent pull control strategies so as to dynamically adapt the number of cards. This is particularly useful for production systems that are subjected to unpredictable changes in the customers’ demand, and need to react quickly to preserve a high level of performance. For this reason, we aim, in this article, at proposing an intelligent system, which can communicate with the information system, whose purpose is to autonomously decide or to help managers in adding or removing cards. In this respect, we propose an approach that uses a neural network which is trained offline, directly from simulation, to decide when it is relevant to change the number of cards, and at what production stage. The learning process, based on multi-objective simulation optimization, aims at reducing the production costs as well as the number of changes to avoid nervousness. The use of stochastic simulation, allows various types of complex problems, related to manufacturing systems, to be addressed and fluctuating demand phenomena to be taken into account. The relevance of our approach is illustrated using six published adaptive ConWIP and Kanban systems. Comparisons with adaptive Kanban and ConWIP systems show that the neural network can automatically learn very relevant knowledge. Good results are obtained in terms of performance, with fewer changes in the number of cards. Several possible future research directions are pointed out.

A general overview of the production management-just-in time approach: an application in a business of otomotiv sector

Purpose- The purpose of this study is to describe the basic-detail definition and features of this approach, to demonstrate the literature of JIT paradigm and to find the best alternative after investigating the working principles of different systems. The study was held in a factory of this company. Methodology- The means of kanban and classical system were tested statistically in order to determine the kanban stock level and classical system differ from each other. Their variances were found and Z test was applied. The simulation was done with respect to the part x for kanban and classical system. Findings- The comparison of the old system with the new system is presented clearly. For the proof of the comparison results, z test and sum of deviations were used together too. The z test proved that the new systems were better than the old systems and also results were found for the sum of squared deviations from the minimum stock. Conclusion- JIT system is surely practicable in Quality management and mostly in Total Quality Management. Some other quality systems began to apply JIT in their own factories. Within the scope of this study, The JIT system supports a better environment for production. By this technique, the scrap rate, lead-time, and the inventory level decrease where efficiency and utilization of the workers and the machines increases.

Setting bin quantities for 2-Bin Kanban systems (version 3)

The 2-bin inventory model has been well-known as a visual version of the basic (Q, r) model for inventory control. Visual control has been a hallmark of the JIT movement in industry toward simplification and transparency. The 2-bin idea is no longer limited to the industrial domain; there is growing empirical evidence that it is now well entrenched as a standard operating principle in hospitals for managing the inventory of medical supplies.However, it is of interest that hospitals, as well as their industrial counterparts, have developed a variation of the 2-bin idea, popularly known as "2-bin Kanban". Rather than maintaining two different sized bins as prescribed in the OR literature, users instead set the two bin quantities equal.This variation of the 2-bin idea, although prevalent in application, has not been thoroughly analyzed in the research literature. We provide a complete analysis of 2-bin Kanban and derive a simple closed form expression for the minimum total cost bin size subject to a specified customer service level, and extend it to the case of n-equal-bins, n > 2. Somewhat surprisingly, it is shown that in the general problem, the optimum bin size can occur at only two possible values, which may be easily computed based on problem parameters. We provide simple conditions that describe which of these two values is the optimum, thus completely solving the problem and providing the practice of inventory management a comprehensive approach of how to specify bin-based control systems.

Addressing over-correction in adaptive card-based pull control systems

ABSTRACTAdaptive card control strategy-based heuristics are used to change the number of cards dynamically in response to stochastic and fluctuated customers’ demands. However, when the decisions are taken in real-time and without the use of forecasts, existing heuristics may yield to change too often the number of cards. This over-correction, related to system nervousness, can induce undesirable effects for the workshop. Our literature analysis underlines that, despite nervousness has been discussed in other industrial areas, it seems not to have been studied in the context of adaptive pull control systems. We first introduce and discuss nervousness in the context of adaptive pull control systems. We identify the main factor that induces nervousness and its consequences. To reduce nervousness, we propose a new approach, which relies both on an adaptive freezing interval and a multi-objective simulation optimisation technique. We first show the relevance of the proposed approach through a comparison with an adaptive Kanban system taken from the literature. This comparison shows that our approach yields better results. In addition, the resulting Pareto front offers flexibility to the decision-maker. The suggested approach can be useful: for managers to better implement their adaptive pull systems, and for decision-makers to define operational procedures taking nervousness into account.

The Kanban system for the assembly process of the model of a forklift

In assembly systems, fast information flow, minimal stock, control of an order realization at every stage, efficient work, reduced labor costs, short turnaround time and simultaneous fast material flow are required. In a just-in-time production, the kanban-based supply and control is applied to ensure the above conditions.In the article, principles and conditions of the Kanban system organization are presented. The method of determining the number of Kanban cards, so that the process runs smoothly and continuously is described.The aim of the article is to design the Kanban system for the assembly process of the forklift model. Technological documentation that is required for the assembly of the final element is developed. This documentation includes the process routing sheet, assembly instruction cards of the forklift, technical drawing and list of components. In the assembly instruction cards, photographs are given in order to facilitate the assembly process of products. Three types of the flow of material and Kanban cards are proposed. Then the best flow is selected. For this flow, equipment items (containers for components mainly) are purchased. Kanban cards are designed and the simulation of the Kanban system during the classes with students is carried out.

Kanban system based on manufacturing equipment operation monitoring

This work paper presents a single-channel Kanban solution where ticketing from downstream operator to the upstream operator in production flow is automatically performed when the completion of operations is identified. Thus, a more efficient transmission and placement mechanism for the tickets is provided for real-time operation of the machines, compared with others Kanban solutions. Our proposed solution contains elements of modern interdisciplinary research: industrial process improvement solutions using one Just in Time methodology: Kanban system, self – harvesting sensors, non-invasive monitoring solutions, multiple-source acquisition software, complex event processing and real-time parallel processing, use of Machine Learning analysis techniques (Deep Learning networks) to identify equipment operating regimes, use of ad hoc radio networks for data communication. The system was developed at an experimental model level. The article presents, with results, a case study in which we have two operators in a production stream. As will be shown, the system has a high degree of scalability, so it can easily be extended to any number of operators in the production stream.

Industrial Design and Simulation of a JIT Material Handling System

A JIT Material Handling System attempts to manufacture products from start to finish by rearranging the factory floor layout away from batch production toward a product layout using flow lines. One of the most accepted JIT production methods used in this work is known as the Kanban system. Kanbans are used to operate a pull system of material control that links all supplying operations to a final assembly line. The ultimate goal of this system is the conversion of raw materials at the Juhel Oral Drug Process plant into finished products with lead time equal to processing time. The flows in the manufacturing model include: the flow of materials, the flow of information, and the flow of cost. These flows create the value streams. Components of the value stream can be value-add or waste, depending on the operating conditions. The simulation model developed in this research work is based on the single-card pull system developed at the Drug Process Plant. This model consists of three blocks (workstations) where there is a buffer located between two workstations. In this model, the material moves according to the Kanban rule. If Kanbans arrive and the material is available, the workstation starts processing the material. This research demonstrates that the design of the JIT system can significantly affect key manufacturing performance measures. JIT implementation cannot provide significant benefits if setup time and variability remain high as well as if the company is not able to optimise the production facilities by product mix. Based on the result from this work, JIT is not based upon rigid concepts. Therefore, successful implementation depends largely on the company’s ability to identify problems, creativity and efforts. The application of single-card pull system coupled with the use of the trigger point results in simpler mechanisms for operating the system.

Impact of the Planning from the Kanban System on the Company’s Operating Benefits

This article reports a model regarding the structural equations of the impact of the planning phase and the benefits acquired in the implementation of the kanban system. It begins with a literature review of the activities of the planning phase, based on which a questionnaire was developed and applied in manufacturing companies in the state of Baja California, in the municipalities of Ensenada, Tijuana, Tecate, and Mexicali. The responses were obtained from 118 questionnaires and were validated by the Cronbach’s alpha index for internal validity and the R-squared index for predictive validity. A model of the structural equations of the planning phase was developed and validated through three latent variables, namely, human resources, preliminary analysis, and kanban integration, which correspond to 22 activities and one variable that integrate 11 operational benefits. The model shows six hypotheses to verify the causal relationships between these variables. Partial least-squares algorithms are used to validate the hypothesis, and the results indicate that the preliminary analysis is the basis for the success of the implementation of the kanban in the planning stage, through the application of activities, such as 5’s, value stream mapping (VSM), material handling, flow diagram, and visual aids with a sustainable approach, according to the efficient flow of materials and minimum downtime.

DMADV approach to evaluate the Adaptive Kanban performance for inventory management process: the case of Moroccan public pharmaceutical supply chain

ABSTRACTThe Moroccan public Pharmaceutical Supply Chain had begun important redesign and improvement of its different logistical components. Its utmost target is to ensure without hindrance right pharmaceuticals, to the right population at the right place and cost. The endeavour of this paper is to propose the Adaptive Kanban System as a new system to manage pharmaceuticals inventory of the Moroccan public Pharmaceutical Supply Chain. Define-Measure-Analyse-Design-Verify methodology is used, to control its behaviour and to address the problem of predicting and evaluating the performance of Adaptive Kanban System, considering the Moroccan Pharmaceutical Supply chain requirements. The relevant findings of this work consist in a better structure of inventory and a decrease of pharmaceutical inventory costs. It also identifies several opportunities for further investigation into the merits of Adaptive Kanban application in the pharmaceutical sector.

A Second-order Model of Lean Manufacturing Implementation to Leverage Production Line Productivity with the Importance-Performance Map Analysis

The objective of this article is to examine the direct path from lean manufacturing (LM) to production line productivity using second-order analysis in a structural equation model (SEM). Data were collected from 236 large manufacturers using a cross-sectional survey. The findings confirmed the positive direct effect of LM practices on production line productivity. The outcome of importance-performance map analysis (IPMA) revealed that the productivity can be leveraged when manufacturing firms are able to produce more than one product model per day with the support of a kanban system to authorize production and material movements. LM supported by a small number of high-performance suppliers leads to improved production line productivity. This study contributes to closing existing gaps of studies investigating the effect of LM on productivity. Practitioners will benefit by understanding the vital constructs of LM practices to improve the overall productivity of a production line.

The Research of Shipbuilding Schedule Planning and Simulation Optimization Technique Based on Constant Work-In-Process System

This paper proposes a shipbuilding schedule planning system based on the constant work-in-process (CONWIP) as a new way to deepen the schedule planning management and implement the lean shipbuilding. It fully discusses the forms, key elements, the ways and processes of implementation, etc. It demonstrates the advantages of the CONWIP system over the KANBAN system and the feasibility of applying the CONWIP system in shipbuilding by taking the flat section manufacturing of the shipbuilding as an example and applying the plant-simulation software to simulation analysis. We also provide the corresponding solutions to solve the problems, found in the application of the CONWIP system, and discuss the process and result of a simulation of the solutions. 1. Background The level and the structure of the shipbuilding production plan are relatively complex, and the derivative of the plan has many kinds of the species. After many years of researches and practices of shipbuilding enterprises in domestic and foreign, the types and classifications of the shipbuilding production plan have become consistent, which means that the shipbuilding production plan is composed of the three types of plans: basic plan, load plan, schedule plan. Basic plan is a programmatic plan in system, load plan is a system of protection plan, and schedule plan is implementation plan. Shipbuilding production planning system is shown in Table 1. Schedule plan usually decomposes the plan into each workstation and process, and then comes into the schedule plan of workstations and processes according to the general production task, the basic plan and building procedure. The plan mainly contains large schedule plan, medium schedule plan, and detailed schedule plan. Large schedule plan mainly refers to the construction of the main process planning, main material demand date, and comprehensive plan of each professional drawing; the medium schedule plan includes preinstallment medium schedule plan, the succeeding medium schedule plan, and installment medium schedule plan, which are based on the erection network scheduling; detailed schedule plan mainly refers to the monthly, weekly, and daily production plan which are made on the standard of the medium schedule plan by the production department. The traditional shipbuilding planning is top-down push plan system. In this system, it requires a complete production management data for production department from the design and planning departments. Load plan and schedule plan are strictly made and carried out on the basis of production load balance which conducted by working hours, capacity, and the data of energy consumption. However, because of the planning system in which monthly plan is made to meet the line table as a starting point, so it lacks of the balance of the actual state. Eventually, this plan system leads to a poor balance and operability, random plan execution, and a great deviation in the actual production situation of the system, because of these the scheduling production relies heavily on spot control. Therefore, during the current time when the lean shipbuilding idea is a consensus of the industry development, how to enhance the schedule planning management has become a key issue for the realization of the lean shipbuilding.

Centralised vs. decentralised control decision in card-based control systems: comparing kanban systems and COBACABANA

Kanban systems are simple yet effective means of controlling production. Production control is decentralised or exercised locally on the shop floor, i.e. a downstream station signals to an upstream station that an item is needed. If items are always the same and known, then demands can be satisfied instantaneously from stock; but if items differ and are unknown, demands must first be propagated backwards from station to station before being satisfied. The former is defined as an inventory control problem and the latter as an order control problem. Handling the order control problem via kanban involves a decentralised card acquisition process (during which information is propagated from station to station) that is separated from the actual production process. COBACABANA (control of balance by card-based navigation), an alternative card-based solution, shares kanban’s control structure but centralises the card acquisition process. Evaluating the two systems therefore provides a unique opportunity to compare decentralised and centralised control. Using simulation, we demonstrate that it is specifically the centralised card acquisition process that allows COBACABANA to balance the workload across resources and thus to outperform kanban in an order control problem. This has major implications for research and practice.

Macro and micro-logistic aspects in defining the parts-feeding policy in mixed-model assembly systems

The handling activities within mixed-model assembly systems deal with two different logistic levels of the production environment. The micro-logistic level includes movements of parts across each assembly station due to pick to assembly activities. The macro-logistic level includes movements of parts within the supermarket and to deliver the stock-keeping units to the assembly stations. The most frequently adopted part-feeding policies, i.e., kanban system and kitting system, strongly influences both logistic levels with opposite effects. The former continuously refills the assembly stations; the latter prepares and delivers kits of components for each product. Moving from kanban to kitting system the time spent at the macro-logistic level increases. On the contrary, the time spent in part handling at the micro-logistic level decreases when moving from kanban to kitting system. Effective trade-offs are encouraged. This paper analyses the two introduced part-feeding policies, including hybrid possibilities, through an operative total handling time comparison model. The findings from five industrial cases belonging to different sectors and a global simulation analysis are discussed. Conclusions about the impact of some of the most important logistic variables of the production system to the whole performances drive the industrial practitioners in the part-feeding policy selection.

Macro and micro-logistic aspects in defining the parts-feeding policy in mixed-model assembly systems

The handling activities within mixed-model assembly systems deal with two different logistic levels of the production environment. The micro-logistic level includes movements of parts across each assembly station due to pick to assembly activities. The macro-logistic level includes movements of parts within the supermarket and to deliver the stock-keeping units to the assembly stations. The most frequently adopted part-feeding policies, i.e., kanban system and kitting system, strongly influences both logistic levels with opposite effects. The former continuously refills the assembly stations; the latter prepares and delivers kits of components for each product. Moving from kanban to kitting system the time spent at the macro-logistic level increases. On the contrary, the time spent in part handling at the micro-logistic level decreases when moving from kanban to kitting system. Effective trade-offs are encouraged. This paper analyses the two introduced part-feeding policies, including hybrid possibilities, through an operative total handling time comparison model. The findings from five industrial cases belonging to different sectors and a global simulation analysis are discussed. Conclusions about the impact of some of the most important logistic variables of the production system to the whole performances drive the industrial practitioners in the part-feeding policy selection.

Kanban for Lean Production in High Mix, Low Volume Environments

Due to its assumed inherent inability to manage custom-engineered parts and components, the Kanban system has traditionally been disregarded in high mix, low volume “engineer-to-order” environments. However, elements of the Kanban system have proven their worth in other turbulent, non-manufacturing environments, such as software development. In this paper, we draw on two case studies from the Maritime sector where Kanban boards and cards have been introduced for the execution phase of shop orders in manufacturing. Initial results have been exceptional, with 50% reduction of lead-time realized in both cases.

Development of a Simulation Based Kanban System for Lean Practitioners

Lean Manufacturing (LM) has been widely known to reduce the seven wastes in manufacturing industries. However, there are few training tools to help lean practitioner in learning and experimenting the LM tools and techniques as they are costly and difficult to create. This research aims is to built a platform for the lean practitioner to learn and experiment with the general Kanban system, by developing Kanban Simulation Training Tool System (K-STTS). K-STTS contains two modules, General Kanban Simulation Module (GKS-module) to deliver Kanban theory by using simulation approach and General Kanban Calculator Module (GKC-module) to help the lean practitioner in Kanban calculation. Arena 14 simulation software and Visual Basic 6 were used to develop the two module respectively. A feasibility study was conducted to assess K-STTS feasibility in terms of user interface aesthetics, operability, learnability and functional suitability. Both module are feasible to be used by lean practitioner, however operability and learnability of GKS-module need a improvisation. Future works include creating simulation based on real scenarios and other LM training tools platform to enhance user’s experience on LM tools.

Internet Based eKanban/eKitting Involving Suppliers

Kanban and Kitting systems have become prevalent over the past 20-30 years however most of these systems are manual or internal. In addition, some companies have struggled implementing these business practices due to internal employee gaming of these systems which has sometimes caused companies to abandon or lose trust in them.This paper provides details on the development and deployment of a web-based environment at a company which involved suppliers, substantially reduced employee gaming and improved managerial oversight of inventory which led to nearly 90% reductions in line-side inventory, nearly 50% reductions in material handling labor while reducing line-side part shortages by over 80%. The technical components of this system and how it was implemented will be reviewed.