A comparison of scheduling approaches for a make-to-order electronics manufacturer

In this paper, we compare two scheduling procedures designed to minimize setup costs for a make-to-order electronics manufacturing. While setup costs are important, quick response is highly valued by the manufacturer´s customers and customer service is negatively impacted when jobs spend too much time in the system. To address this issue, we simulate the factory running with the schedules produced by these two procedures and compare the output based on the age of jobs remaining unprocessed at the end of one production shift. The simulation results show that the scheduling procedure that results in the lowest setup cost does not necessarily yield the best job age distribution.