Optimization of production planning and scheduling process: the Luxottica case.

Production planning aims to organize the production activity, making it consistent with the business plans which define the economic and financial objectives of the entire company. In manufacturing companies, it concerns with defining the production plans or programs and establishes what, how much and when to produce, with different levels of detail and different time horizons. Among the planning activities, scheduling is responsible for organizing production in the short term, the work shift or the day. It is decision-making process allowing to create and assign a sequence of activities to each resource (equipment, machines, operators). Technological development has enabled the birth of new tools useful for managing the production process. The latter, integrated within the production line, allows to enhance the effectiveness and the efficiency of the company’s management functions. The purpose of this study is to create and evaluate a new algorithm for scheduling the sanding and buffing processes within the production flow of plastic glasses in the Luxottica department located in Agordo. These working is an intermediate phase of the process to remove the sprue creating by the injection presses during the moulding of the frontal. The algorithm takes into consideration three factors, not currently considered in the scheduling, with the aim of improving efficiency and service level. The latters play a key role as performance indices in the evaluation of the departement‘s production. In detail, the first factor has pointed out for this specific study as a priority index and shows great potential as useful tool in the scheduling of all the other processes within Luxottica's departments. The second factor is the division of the machines by type of processing to optimize set-up times. In the end, the third factor concerns with looking ahead, i.e., what is being processed on the presses and what will soonly come in for sanding and buffing. A design of experiment is used to evaluate the effectiveness of these factors. This technique, used in the early stages of a new process, allows, through field trials, to determine the main factors that influence performance goals.