Operational Control of Automated PCB Assembly Lines

The rapidly changing market demand characteristics, the increased pace of technological developments and fiercer competition has forced almost any industrial company to fundamentally rethink its manufacturing strategy (cf. Hayes and Wheelwright[1984], Skinner[1985]). In gaining competitive advantage quality, flexibility and speed of innovation have become important performance measures, next to being efficient (Bolwijn et al.[1986], Buzacott[1982], Solberg et al.[1985], Bullinger et al.[1986]). These changes have affected industrial organisations at almost every level: in logistics (MRP, DRP), marketing and product development (DFA, DFM) as well as in operations on the shopfloor itself, by the introduction of CNC machining centres and, finally, of Flexible Manufacturing Systems (FMS) and Flexible Assembly Systems (FAS).