Optimal Reconfiguration of Complex Production Lines for Profit Maximization via Simulation Modeling

Abstract

With the recent trend of re-shoring, transferring manufacturing systems from a workforce-intensive to a capital-intensive production environment becomes more common. One challenge multinational manufacturing companies may face in such an endeavor is reconfiguration of the transferred manufacturing system according to the availability of better machinery in the capital-intensive environment. In this dissertation, based on a real-life problem, I develop several simulation optimization methods for the problem of production line reconfiguration. The case is a reverse transfer of manufacturing system/technology, i.e. transfer from a workforce-intensive environment to a capital-intensive one. I investigate the performances of nine different simulation optimization approaches based on the real-life case in automotive industry to illustrate their relative strengths under different parameter scenarios. I also create a test-bed problem to determine the specifications of these methods, and further analyze their performances. Numerical results may guide the practitioners facing similar challenges in choosing a suitable solution approach depending on the problem size and solution time availability.