A Hybrid Simulated Annealing Algorithm to the Cell Formation Problem with Alternative Process Plans

In this study, a simulated annealing algorithm with mutation operator is proposed to solve the manufacturing cell formation problem considering multiple process routings for part. The proposed algorithm is designed mainly to explore solution regions efficiently and to expedite the solution search process. The performance of the proposed algorithm is tested by a range of test problems from the literature. The comparative study shows that the proposed algorithm is capable of obtaining quick and favorable solutions.