Flexible production architecture for a smart factory

Abstract

Product design evolves with time and the needs in each time period. The resulting change in the product design often varies in terms of ease of redesign depending on the components within a product, with modular designs often resulting in greater ease of said redesign. The redesign of products will also result in the appropriate changes in a product assembly line. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the methodology required in identification and evaluation of component redesign of a product in accordance to current trends. A methodology will also be proposed for the reorganization of the affect assembly line and how to achieve optimality in a context of a smart factory, before proceeding with case studies using current market products to apply the methodologies discussed.