Digital Transformation of Facility Layout Design: Problem Analysis, Model Optimization, Simulation and Automation

This thesis strives to study the past research works, highlight the gaps, recent trends, and identify the Facility Layout Design Drivers. Furthermore, the design drivers can assist in building a holistic framework aligned with this rapid digital transformation towards designing a flexible facility layout. Practically, a developed heuristic algorithm has been built and programmed in Python, able to produce fast Facility Layout (FL) problem solution models that can be embedded in the intelligent systems. The results show that it is competitive, fast, and practical after applying it to a real case study (Manufacturing Department). The research introduces an automatic system for method time measurement able to collect the data in real-time relying on Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) and Internet of Things technologies to measure the movement time of the worker on the shopfloor automatically and assist the designer in drawing the Spaghetti Charts in an automatic way aligning with smart factory requirements overcoming that limitation. The automatic systems (Method Time Measurement (MTM), Simulation, and Spaghetti Chart (SC)) are promising and helpful for designing flexible facility layouts. Automated MTM system can remotely track the worker, collects real-time data providing FL designer with high accuracy time measurement enabling him to create Spaghetti Charts of human movement between machines and destinations easier and faster.