Modular Modeling and Optimization of Temporal Manufacturing Processes with Inventories

Smart manufacturing requires streamlining operations and optimizing processes at a global and local level. This paper considers temporal manufacturing processes that involve physical or virtual inventories of products, parts and materials that move through a network of subprocesses. The inventory levels vary with time and are a function of the configuration settings of the machines involved in the process. These environments require analysis, e.g., answering what-if questions, and optimization to determine optimal operating settings for the entire process. To address this problem, the paper proposes modular process components that can represent these manufacturing environments at various levels of granularity for performing what-if analysis and decision optimization queries. These components are extensible and reusable against which optimization and what-if questions can be posed. Additionally, the paper describes the steps to translate these complex components and optimization queries into a formal mathematical programming model, which is then solved by a commercial optimization solver.