Periodic Workload Control: A Viable Alternative for Semiconductor Manufacturing

This paper analyzes a rule based workload control model applied to a scaled-down semiconductor simulation model. We compare two well established continuous order release models from the semiconductor domain, namely the Starvation Avoidance (SA) and the CONstant LOAD (ConLOAD) approach, with the COrrected aggregate Load Approach (COLA) which was originally developed for small and medium enterprises in make-to-order companies. The main difference between these order release approaches is that the former two (SA and ConLOAD) release orders continuously whereas the latter (COLA) releases orders at periodic intervals. Contrary to earlier research on order release models for semiconductor models we show that the periodic order release model outperforms the other two continuous mechanisms by yielding lower costs and better timing performance. Thus, this paper highlights that periodic rule based order release models are a viable alternative which was largely neglected in recent semiconductor literature.