Adjusting the Factory Planning Process when Using Immature Technologies

Due to shorter product-life-cycles, innovations in production engineering have to keep pace with today's technologies. As a result, factory planning is more and more challenged by technologies being immature for series production. Usually, these immature technologies place special demands on production layout and quality management, for example. These demands have to be considered in the factory planning process. Moreover, technologies are part of the production process that is created by a series of technologies. Hence, a planning process has to ensure that the positive aspects of a new technology are not negated by arrangements to protect the technology chain against failure due to immature technologies.

With Selective Laser Melting (SLM) used as example for an additive manufacturing technology, this paper presents a method of planning a production system by taking the technology maturity into account. Possible requirements of an immature technology interacting with the process chain will be addressed as well as adjustments to be made to the factory planning process.