CIM optimization

Having studied the development trend of manufacturing technology and determined to be in the forefront of a new field, the principal author of this paper began working on 'Integrated Computer-Aided Design, Manufacture and Management System' in 1975. This system has in recent years become a very important manufacturing research topic and is called 'Computer Integrated Manufacturing' (CIM). It is now regarded by researchers and governments of industrialized nations as the manufacturing technology of the future. CIM is a very broad and complex mix of concepts and strategy and is about integration of computers, machines and management of business activities. Firms moving into the 1990s' environment are increasingly aware of the strategic contribution which manufacturing can make to fulfilling corporate goals. Central to any manufacturing strategy will be extensive use of Advanced Manufacturing Technologies based on some variation of Computer Integrated Manufacturing (CIM). However, such radical innovation is only likely to succeed if investments are located in a broad strategy framework which identifies clearly how technology is going to underpin the manufacturing strategy and the sequence in which CIM can be optimized. This paper describes original work carried out in constructing a strategy-based quantitative technique, which aims not only to formulate a strategy for Computer Integrated Manufacturing Optimization (incorporating elements of a financial justification for the investment), but also identifies means of monitoring implementation performance against strategy. The approach is further extended through the use of simulation to deal with problems when the relevant probability distributions can be postulated. Simultaneous considerations of the revenues, production costs, salvage values and economics (many of the costs and system characteristics for individual firms) require considerable effort. The development of strategic plans for the stepwise introduction of CIM optimization requires models and modelling techniques to describe the business processes, functions and the required data and their relation to the desired system components. The framework for computer implementation of the methodology is discussed. The integration of procedures into a CIM optimization cycle to enable the evaluation of CIM subsystems can provide a holistic means of identifying weaknesses in optimizing company resources and what is termed 'CIM solutions', encouraging a wider application at CIM techniques in industry. This evolutionary development of an optimization model for the operational evaluation of an integrated manufacturing system does not seek to answer any identifiable problem, but to provide the mechanism for future investigations. It is therefore intended to be a generalised model applicable to various manufacturing environments elected by the user.