A methodology to support the economic justification of reconfigurable automation for batch size of one or more production environments

The economic live-cycle of consumer electronic products has decreased to six to twelve months. With this very compressed product life it has become difficult to justify the use of automation to support the production of these products. This dissertation presents a methodology that combines the use of discrete-event simulation and engineering economic principles to identify manufacturing system designs that maximize the economic performance of the system over its economic life. This methodology attempts to recognize the economic benefit of system component reuse provided by reconfigurable automation technology. In today's global economy, product demand can change rapidly. This research demonstrates how discrete-event simulation tools, conventional spreadsheets, and relational database management can be used to develop production range profiles for a series of manufacturing system designs that provide the best economic performance based on a series of economic justification criteria.