Cyber collaborative warehouse with dual-cycle operations design

• Published in: International journal of production research Vol. 61; no. 19; pp. 6552 - 6564
• Main Authors: Dusadeerungsikul, Puwadol Oak, Nof, Shimon Y.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Taylor & Francis 02.10.2023; Taylor & Francis LLC
• Subjects: Collaboration; Collaborative robot; Cyber-physical system; Cyber-physical systems; Design; Factories of the future; Multi-agents system; Multiagent systems; Protocol; Task Administration Protocol; Warehouses
• ISSN: 0020-7543; 1366-588X
• DOI: 10.1080/00207543.2022.2132313

Warehouse operations have been significantly improved because of the rapid advancement of cyber-physical system technologies, preparing for Work-of-the-Future. The challenge, however, is how to design a collaborative system to deliver optimal performance by multiple agents who are highly distributed but interconnected and operate with technologies that provide massive amounts of real-time data. To address the challenge, in this article, the Cyber Collaborative Protocol for Dual-Cycle Task in Future Warehouse is developed to minimise total operation cost and time. The problem is addressed in two phases; the Global and Local phases. The global phase has higher computational power, maintaining a mathematical model, while the local phase has limited computational power and time, utilising heuristics to deliver the outcome. Computer experiments are utilised for validating the designed protocol compared with other alternatives. The results show that, in all given scenarios, the newly designed protocol outperforms alternatives with statistical significance. The original contribution of this research is the design and control of Cyber Collaborative Warehouse operations with a new focus on collaborative multi-agent interactions. In addition, a major implication is that future warehouses can benefit competitively by operating with Task Administration Protocols such as the new Cyber Collaborative Protocol for Dual-Cycle Task in Future Warehouse.