Simulation-based Assessment of Segmentation and Control Strategies within Multi-variant Productions

The increasing individualization of products is an enormous challenge for manufacturing companies. An increase of product variants and thus product complexity leads to increased process complexity within productions. An option to face this challenge is the segmentation of productions. Unfortunately, it is hardly possible to assess segmentation and the corresponding control strategies by using common methods, such as value stream mapping. Therefore, a simulation-based approach to assess segmentation and control strategies within multi-variant productions is shown in this paper. The approach is applied for a multi-variant production for medical equipment. Besides the development of the approach, the paper also shows the assessment results for the case study production.