New technology from Mitsubishi Electric uses its Maisart artificial intelligence (AI) technology for the efficient design of production floor layouts and material flows as well as the accurate estimation of productivity. The approach enables comparison of highly accurate production line improvement plans and reduces the time it takes to roughly half the time normally required.

When making improvements to production lines, the floor layout and materials flow are typically designed Source: Mitsubishi Electricseparately. As a consequence, issues such as insufficient work areas, excessively long routes between processes or work flows that cross paths are often identified only after the overall improvement plan is developed, which slows down efforts to resolve such problems. The Maisart AI solution enables companies to better understand design-task interrelationships by identifying potential problems during the design stage and also by using AI-generated work data to estimate productivity in simulation.

The new technology integrates the designing of production-floor layouts and materials flow for the quick identification and resolution of potential issues, which is a challenge in conventional nonintegrated design environments. Information such as distance-intensity analytical data, which is generated dynamically as improvements are designed, can be visualized. Layouts, material flows and speed of materials moving between processes are be displayed with easy-to-understand graphics to enhance the quality of planning.

Data are automatically generated for reliable production-volume calculations based on data from actual production processes, such as changes in process times and work efficiencies. Using these data, production volume can be simulated with more than 90% accuracy, and multiple improvement plans can be compared in terms of expected productivity.