A pull VPLs based release policy and dispatching rule for semiconductor wafer fabrication

In this paper, we present a pull VPLs based release policy and dispatching rule for semiconductor wafer fabrication. Based on the virtual production lines (VPLs), production time and WIP are allocated for each process step by products. Then a pull release policy and dispatching rule is proposed to control each VPL. We generate a SWFS case from a real-life wafer fab to evaluate the performances of the proposed methodology. Results of the numerical experiments show that the proposed methodology is effective in solving multi-objective scheduling problems for semiconductor wafer fabrication system (SWFS).