Variance-based sampling for cycle time - throughput confidence intervals

In the analysis of a manufacturing system, the analyst is often interested in the change in mean cycle time as a function of different throughput (start rate) levels. Since the variance of the mean cycle time generally increases as the start rate increases, an equal allocation of simulation effort at each simulated throughput level results in confidence intervals of different widths. This paper discusses an approach for generating nearly equal sized mean cycle time confidence intervals at selected throughput levels when the computing budget is fixed (limited). The simulation effort allocation procedure described in this paper determines the proportion of the fixed budget to allocate at each throughput level based on the asymptotic variance.