Make-to-order scheduling in foundry semiconductor fabrication

Abstract

On-time delivery is one of the performance measurements in the make-to-order semiconductor industry. Many control policies, such as input dispatching rules, CONWIP and optimization-based rules, have been implemented based on the managing objectives of the fabrication line. These models focus, however, mainly on the high throughput, short cycle time and high equipment utilization which are proper for the mass production in the semiconductor industry. In this paper, three due date-based production control models are suggested: the target control model, the movement control model and the WIP control model. Mathematical formulations using linear programming are given, and the effectiveness of the proposed models is evaluated by computational experiment. It is shown that suggested models outperform models in the literature with respect to the throughput and on-time delivery.

Keywords:

• Semiconductor fabrication
• Stepper scheduling
• Make-to-order