Cloud based data capture and representation for simulation in small and medium enterprises

The data collection and representation phase is an important phase within the lifecycle of a DES study. It is recognized that for large companies the data collection and representation phase differs when compared to SMEs. DES is not widely used by small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs) due to complexity and related costs being prohibitively high. DES-related data can be stored in a variety of formats and it is not always evident what data is required (if even available) to support a DES model in relation to specific problem scenarios. Building on previous research output, this paper presents the implementation of a Cloud based SaaS application to process input data from a SME in the medical industry and to output this information to in a usable format towards data-driven automated simulation model building.