Design and Planning of Manufacturing Networks for Mass Customisation and Personalisation: Challenges and Outlook

Manufacturers and service providers are called to design, plan and operate globalized manufacturing networks, addressing to challenges such as ever-decreasing lifecycles and increased product complexity. These factors, caused primarily by mass customisation and demand volatility, generate a number of issues related to the design and planning of manufacturing systems and networks, which are not holistically tackled in industrial and academic practices. The mapping of production performance requirements to process and production planning requires automated closed-loop control systems, which current systems fail to deliver. Technology-based business approaches are an enabler for increased enterprise performance. Towards that end, the issues discussed in this paper focus on challenges in the design and planning of manufacturing networks in a mass customization and personalization landscape. The development of methods and tools for supporting the dynamic configuration and optimal routing of manufacturing networks and facilities under cost, time, complexity and environmental constraints to support product-service personalization are promoted.