Entropy Based versus Combinatorial Product Configuration Complexity in Mass Customized Manufacturing

Increased product differentiation in the context of mass-customized production causes significant changes in complexity of manufacturing and assembly systems. There are several approaches to defining product variety induced complexity. Our focus in this paper is to describe procedure to calculate product configuration complexity based on the Boltzmann's entropy theory. Proposed approach is applied on a realistic example of mass customized manufacture of washing machines. Subsequently, we compare obtained measures with product configuration measures based on a combinatorial method. On the basis of the computational experiments, strong correlation between the two mentioned approaches has been observed. Finally, obtained findings are commented.