A Real-time Manufacturing Risk Management System: An Integrated RFID Approach

It is inevitable to face production problems in various aspects such as human fallibility, defective processes and unreliable technologies in industrial manufacturing business. Thus, bar-code-based shop floor control systems have been widely adopted in order to monitor the production processes. Striking issues can be identified easily by those systems. However, potential and critical risks cannot be identified by those systems such that both operational effectiveness and economical profit are significantly affected. This paper proposes a RFID-based risk management system (RRMS) that not only identifies the potential risks during production processes, it also suggests relative solutions to tackle those risks. The proposed system integrates the technologies of RFID and rule-based reasoning (RBR) with risk management concept to help monitor shop floor operations. Through pilot running of the RRMS in the ABC Limited, a significant improvement in terms of shop floor responsiveness was achieved.