A Comparison of Job-shop and Group Technology Using Simulation by ARENA

Abstract

Production planning is performed through diverse methods according to the type of the system it is structured upon. One of the most important steps before production planning is to determine which system best fits the firm, and how the facilities should be designed. Both job-shop and group-technology systems have their own cons and pros, each of which is suitable to a specific kind of factory. On the other hand, performance measurement is also important in terms of both productivity and queue factors. A good method to measure the performance is computer simulation by software such as ARENA. This paper utilizes the software for simulating both job-shop and group-technology systems separately for a special firm and it consequently compares the results. The results show group-technology system is better than job-shop system in both productivity and queue factors, and it is highly recommended the system be changed.