DEVELOPMENT OF A SCHEDULING MODEL FOR POLARIZER MANUFACTURING LOGISTICS

Abstract

Polaroid films, or the so-called "polarizer", is an optical device that transforms natural light into some form of polarized light. When the form of films, it is widely used in thin display equipment, such as liquid crystal displays (LCDs). The polarizer manufacturing industry is under constant competition to lower its price with the continuous price reduction in LCD markets. This paper is particularly concerned with its logistics problems, with a focus on minimizing the cost for purchasing cores used in moving films in the process. The core movement for polarizer logistics is formulated into a linear programming (LP) problem by employing an event-based pull approach that has been proposed earlier by Karimi et al. [Karaimi, I. A.; Sharafali, M.; Mahalingam, H. AIChE J., 2004, 51, 178-197]. Two numerical examples are presented to illustrate the applicability of the proposed model, and some remarks also are made.