Virtual Manufacturing Enterprise Research Articles

The Application of Manufacturing Execution System in Virtual Manufacturing

Compaired with mart manufacturing and digital manufacturing, virtual manufacturing is a more advanced mode, which is more flexible, more inexpensive and more suitable for modern competitive society. No matter what type of manufacturing, Manufacturing Execution System (MES) is necessary and plays a key role. So this paper focuses on the MES in virtual manufacturing. MES serves as a bridge to connect the upper planning layer and the control layer of the factory. It has at least 8 functions, including data collection, production process management, human resource management, workpieces tracking, production planning and scheduling, quality control, documentation system and maintenance management. As a typical virtual manufacturing enterprise, the company A is chosen to be introduced, including the background, composition of MES and implementation of MES.

Integration of the Automated Control Systems at a Manufacturing Enterprise

The strategic development of Russian manufacturing during the creation of a digital economy and the implementation of Industry 4.0 is analyzed. The digital transformation of industry is considered in relation to new architectural models and standards. A practice-oriented model is proposed for the teaching of digital competency by means of a virtual manufacturing enterprise.

Manage and control information flow in virtual manufacturing enterprises

Requirements set by clients regarding, on the one hand, the highest quality of services provided, on the other hand, shorter and shorter order completion dates, cause that enterprises are often unable to cope with them. A production load or limited production resources also means that enterprises are no longer able to accept a new order for their production plan. The following problem is outlined here - send the customer away empty-handed, or try to execute the order, but with a much later execution date and expose to the cost of contractual penalties. Therefore, solutions are sought, which can be particularly advantageous for producers in the small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) sector, for whom this is an increasingly frequent problem - sometimes means “to be or not to be” on the market. One of the possibilities for enterprises is to use the concept of a virtual manufacturing enterprises, which mainly consists in sharing the free production capacity of each producer within the virtual network A network that has been established even between individual enterprises that are geographically dispersed. By establishing a group of several companies cooperating at the same time, one should find such a thread of agreement that it would be possible to cooperate, and also to achieve a common goal, which is to make a final product for the recipient. If it is necessary to make a final product that meets the assumed criteria, it is necessary not only to define the level of cooperation, but also there exists much need for a mechanism to manage and control information flow among manufacturers. Therefore, it is necessary to have information on production issues, such as the quantity and quality of spare production capacities, their access time, additional resources, semi-finished products, and since these are geographically dispersed enterprises, the location of each enterprise is also important. In addition, the network itself is established on the basis of information contained in the production order, so you can adjust the number of participants to your needs, and assign tasks accordingly. All executive actions are taken on the basis of the proposed algorithm, which describes the entire decision-making process, how to collect information, where to keep them, and above all, who should be responsible for providing information.

Production flow planning method applied to virtual manufacturing enterprises

The development of production technologies, customer-centric philosophies and, above all, increased uncertainty around today’s market, make companies look for solutions that would support their functioning on the market. Keeping up with changes requires, among other things, proper planning of production processes and high investments in innovative technological solutions. For this reason, it is increasingly difficult to make a modern product alone. That is why enterprises from the small and medium enterprises sector are looking for solutions that would enable to continue production without the need to have all the specialized production resources dedicated to individual products. Therefore, companies outsource the choice, configuration and or manufacture components that they are not able to do themselves. Another option is to join the virtual manufacturing network, where manufacturers temporarily share their spare capacity. Such cooperation is possible even for individual enterprises that are geographically dispersed. The proposed solution of generation of possible production routes (based on game theory) also takes into account the time and costs required to transport intermediates between manufacturers (alternative routes). The obtained results are the lead time and costs of manufacturing processes.

A multi-criterion partner selection problem for virtual manufacturing enterprises under uncertainty

We study a partner selection problem for virtual manufacturing enterprises facing an uncertain environment. We propose a new method of using the grey system theory to account for uncertainties in a project's start time, completion time, transportation time, as well as cost. We first develop the concepts of delivery time agreement index and cost agreement index, and then formulate a multi-objective partner selection problem that maximizes the minimum delivery time agreement index, the average delivery time agreement index and the cost agreement index. A chaotic particle swarm optimization (CPSO) algorithm is developed. Extensive computational results show that the proposed CPSO method outperforms the standard PSO in providing quality solutions more reliably.

Collaborative open innovation management in virtual manufacturing enterprises

This paper addresses the challenging problem of collaborative open innovation in the context of Virtual Enterprises. The illustrated solutions, which represent the outcome of the BIVEE European project, are based on a knowledge-centric approach and a business innovation reference framework characterised by flexible guidelines, capable of providing useful guidance without hindering freedom and creativity with tight engineering practice. Based on this a software platform has been developed and experimented in different industrial settings, providing very positive feedback.

Service Performance Monitoring and Control Toolset

As service sectors in manufacturing companies become more and more important, Performance Indicators (PIs) will need to be taken into further consideration in order to assess the efficiency and effectiveness of service performances. Hence, PIs are designed to help the organizations and decision makers to better understand how well they are performing in relation to their strategic, tactical and operational goals. While keeping in mind that services are contributing more and more to rise an enterprise turnover, measuring and controlling their performances plays an important role in turning company strategic objectives and goals to reality. It is essential for a company to determine the most significant indicators, how they are related to the formulated company goals and how they depend on performed activities. In this respect, the purpose of this paper is to lay out a method for generating and selecting the PIs related to particular service system requirements.This paper defines an overall PI Toolset which has been developed specifically for Virtual Manufacturing Enterprise (VME) but could also be used for a single enterprise and for a wider set of enterprises in cooperation with additional bodies (e.g. Labs, Industrial associations, universities, etc…). Especially, PI Toolset could be adopted by VMEs in order to improve the management of the service system they want to create through the specification and classification of precised use case objectives. After analyzing the state of the art in literature, a new approach has been developed which provides both a governance methodology and a list of relevant PIs for services. Actually, the proposed PI Toolset may help enterprises in selecting the activity to be monitored, controlled and measured through appropriate PIs. The proposed method essentially consists of a guideline to design, implement and classify effective PIs related to an enterprise's goals and objectives.

Organizing a virtual manufacturing enterprise: an analytic network process based approach for enterprise flexibility

Virtual manufacturing is a dynamic enterprise structure that will enable future competitiveness in the fast changing business environment. This is made possible through quick IT based integration of flexible and core competent business entities capable of providing value-added product and services. Flexibility elements represent change capabilities of enterprise wide processes and resources in time and cost dimensions. Value chain considerations require synergy among the participating flexible resources. Also decision information synchronization delays need to be managed so that other entity flow processes in the enterprise remain well synchronized. This may require a capability of dynamic changes in flexible structures leading to effective virtual enterprises. There is a need to develop suitable enterprise architectures for virtual enterprises that offer an increasing focus on agility. Infrastructure support for integration of flexible capability to attain synergy among resources is necessary for enterprise agility. We conceptualize virtual manufacturing (VM) as an integrating infrastructure of flexible resources made possible through alliance of enterprises that are individually core competent in specific business function. Such a VM can attain the required cost, flexibility and responsiveness characteristics in its operations to provide solution to the demanding customer in a global dynamic market. Modelling frameworks depicting these composite flexibility states have complex and tacit interrelationship with plural business goals. Analytical network process (ANP) has been used to model the interrelationship of different decision domains with a view to prioritize enterprise wide flexibility dimensions. The ANP modelling framework takes into consideration the interdependency among sub-strategies. We demonstrate through sensitivity analysis that strategic shift is required to accommodate changes due to dynamic condition in the business environment.

A hybrid control architecture and coordination mechanism in virtual manufacturing enterprise

The concept of Virtual Enterprise (VE), a special organization of manufacturing units and enterprises, has attracted considerable attention in recent years. Unlike traditional enterprise, VE is most suitable in production environments that experience frequent changes in product mix. To complete a complex task composed of some sub-tasks, traditional control architecture is not versatile enough to coordinate and schedule multi-site and multi-type resources, especially in resolving resource conflicts during operations. Using hybrid control architecture, VE can execute the effective control on multi-site enterprises to support the rapid response to customer demands. Coordination mechanism running through the total life cycle of VE is applied to coordinating and scheduling the requests from different tasks and resources, which make VE flexible, adaptive and robust. In this paper, the hybrid control architecture based on multi-agent technology that supports the cooperation of enterprises is presented. Coordination mechanism and the corresponding optimal models are discussed. Finally a case study is used as an illustration to present the detailed coordination mechanism.

Modelling and simulation of a virtual manufacturing enterprise

A manufacturing enterprise is a complex hierarchical entity with multiple components that are essential to the success of the firm. Such an enterprise must implement successful strategic and tactical policies at the various levels of the organization. High-level executive strategies determine long-term investment policies, while lower level decisions affect short-term operations. This research models a manufacturing enterprise and implements the model in a competitive simulation game. The simulation links various decisions made at different levels of the enterprise to its advancement. The simulation is designed to operate in a competitive environment that includes multiple enterprises, depending on the number of users participating in a given exercise. Accurately representing a manufacturing enterprise in a concise simulation model has many challenges that must be overcome. This paper discusses relationship models used to link enterprise factors, as well as methods for aggregating various factor influences. Furthermore, two types of simulation methods and their application to modelling such an enterprise are discussed. These methods include analytical based simulation and discrete-event simulation. A methodology for creating a model that includes both types is presented and a technique for linking the two methods is provided. The methodology is demonstrated using numerical results.

A methodology for evaluating the manufacturing ability of equipment in virtual enterprises

This paper proposes a methodology for evaluating the manufacturing ability of equipment in a multi-agent-based virtual manufacturing enterprise by enveloping the manufacturing information of the various equipment as equipment agents. The manufacturing ability of equipment consists of two classes: the processing ability and the processing capability of the equipment. The processing ability of equipment indicates the tasks and operations that the equipment can perform, and is peculiar to the equipment. The processing capability of equipment shows the capability of the equipment to undertake and accomplish a specified task under some constraints, such as time and cost, and it depends on both the equipment and the task. It varies with different equipment and tasks, and at different times. The concept of an operation spectrum of equipment is introduced to verify the processing ability of the equipment, and methods are formulated to calculate the current capability of the equipment and estimate the cost for bidding for new tasks. The proposed methodology on the manufacturing ability of the equipment in a virtual enterprise can be implemented easily using equipment agents. This methodology can support the equipment agents to bid for new tasks as real independent agents in virtual manufacturing enterprises or multi-site enterprises.

A Time-Bound Framework for Negotiation and Decision Makingof Virtual Manufacturing Enterprise

Virtual manufacturing has 2 characteristics as an agent-based electronic commerce environment: dynamic nature of resource status and variety of agents' decision-making (i.e., scheduling) model. To reflect the characteristics, a relevant negotiation protocol should be designed and an appropriate decision-making model should be developed. In this article, from the perspective of a sales agent that is a middle man between customers and manufacturers in a virtual manufacturing environment, we provide a case study that suggests a time-bound framework for external negotiation between sales agents and customer agents, and internal cooperation between sales agents and manufacturing agents. We assume a job shop as the production model of a virtual manufacturing enterprise and formulate the optimal order selection problem with mixed integer programming, but its computation time is not acceptable for real-world problems. For this time-constrained decision making, we develop a genetic algorithm as an anytime problem-solving method for the scheduling of the production model, which shows a reasonable computation time for real-world cases and good incremental problem-solving capability.

Agent-based optimisation of logistics and production planning

Manufacturing and logistics service provision enterprises are currently moving towards open virtual enterprise collaboration networks to meet the needs of the Global Economy. In such networks, manufacturing and logistics planning and scheduling is challenging due to the difficulties in integrating information from different partners and in exploring a large and dynamically changing number of planning and scheduling alternatives. Agent-based technology is considered suitable to support planning and scheduling in such enterprises because agents can dynamically adapt their behaviour to changing requirements and they can reduce the number of planning and scheduling alternatives via negotiation. This paper presents an agent-based approach for supporting logistics and production planning, taking into account not only production schedules but also availability and cost of logistic service providers. This is achieved through efficient negotiation mechanisms based on an extended contracting protocol. The agent infrastructure is being developed within the context of Agentcities, a successful EU-funded initiative to build a world-wide distributed and open platform which provides agent-based services. The proposed approach is illustrated in a case study concerning optimisation of production planning of a virtual manufacturing enterprise in relation to sub-contracted logistic services used to transport materials between the enterprise units.

Agent-Based Optimisation of Logistics and Production Planning

Manufacturing and logistics service provision enterpri ses are now moving towards open architectures for integrating thei r acti vities with those of their suppliers. customers and partners within wide supply chain networks. Agent-based technology provides a natural way to design and implement such environments.This paper presents an agent-based approach for optimising logistics and production planning whilst taking into account availability and cost of logistic providers. Emphasis is given on efficient negotiation mechani sms based on extended contracting protocol. The agent infrastructure is being developed within the context of Agentcities, a successful EU funded agent system interoperation initiative.The proposed approach is demonstrated in a case study concerning optimisation of production planning of a virtual manufacturing enterprise in relation to sub-contracted logistic services used to transport the materials between the enterprise units.

Logistics, Maintenance, Production in Virtual Manufacturing Enterprise

The aim of this paper is to study new information technologies for Virtual Manufacturing Enterprise (VME). It focuses on three main parts: Logistics management; Maintenance function and Production workshop (LMP). Co-ordination between maintenance function, production workshop and logistics within technical service are shown for different enterprise organisation structures.

Capacity Models for Scheduling the Virtual Enterprise

Many papers have addressed planning methods for distributed and virtual manufacturing enterprises, however the underlying capacity models on which they are based tend to be simplistic and unrealistic, particularly when describing a complicated manufacturing site such as a semiconductor wafer fabrication facility. There are many methods of capacity modelling ranging from spreadsheet solutions to simulation. Assessing existing models on a continuum shows a gap between 'resource profiling' and 'discrete event simulation' where the requirements for wafer fabrication capacity models fall. A macro-simulation model which uses the statistical power of a queuing theory approach to improve on the current inadequate resource profile methods is briefly described.