AN INDUSTRIAL DYNAMICS APPROACH TO FACILITIES PLANNING,
Abstract
A computer simulation model is developed for testing alternative facilities planning policies within an industrial environment. A field survey was conducted to determine the structure and information inputs of facilities planning policies representative of current industrial practice. The company modelled in the study is a hypothetical medium-sized manufacturing plant, typical of the firms contacted in the field survey. Six major model sectors were considered: production-distribution, capital equipment, facilities planning, system evaluation, customer ordering, and exogenous input. Within the capital equipment sector, five distinct facility types were also recognized: production equipment, storage space, office space, plant space, and auxiliary facilities. Many interactions often suppressed by analytic models were explicitly considered; for example, customer ordering was partially dependent upon the company's delivery delay rather than being specified exogenously. The policies tested varied in terms of whether facilities were ordered 'as needed' or periodically, whether or not a minimum order was specified, and whether need for facilities was based upon the current or the anticipated level of business. Using after-tax corporate profits as the criterion variable, the best policies were those that expanded capacity in anticipation of future growth. Policies responding only to existing needs stagnated because the current business level was limited by present capacity while capacity expansion required a substantial increase in current business. (Author)
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 1969
- Accession Number
- AD0687299
Entities
People
- James F. Burns
- Philip E. Hicks
Organizations
- University of Florida