Scheduling method for single-arm multi-cluster tools with residency time constraints

In semiconductor manufacturing, the throughout analysis and robot action sequence are crucial for multi-cluster tools scheduling problems. This paper studies a general robot scheduling problem for multi-cluster tools with the single-arm robot and buffer process modules. Firstly, the scheduling model with constraints of processing module and robots transport is addressed. Secondly, the lower bound of cycle time is theoretically proved. And based on decomposition idea, the heuristic scheduling method, which produces robot action sequence by virtue of random processing time and cycle time, is proposed. Finally, the superiority of the proposed method is proved simulation results.