A cloud-based simulated annealing algorithm for order acceptance problem with weighted tardiness penalties in permutation flow shop scheduling

Make-to-order is a production strategy in which manufacturing starts only after a customer''s order is received; in other words, it is a pull-type supply chain operation since manufacturing is carried out as soon as the demand is confirmed. This paper studies the order acceptance problem with weighted tardiness penalties in permutation flow shop scheduling with MTO production strategy, the objective function of which is to maximize the total net profit of the accepted orders. The problem is formulated as an integer-programming (IP) model, and a cloud-based simulated annealing (CSA) algorithm is developed to solve the problem. Based on the number of candidate orders the firm receives, fifteen problems are generated. Each problem is regarded as an experiment, which is conducted five times to compare the efficiency of the proposed CSA algorithm to the one of simulated annealing (SA) algorithm previously suggested for the problem. The experimental results testify to the improvement in objective function values yielded by CSA algorithm in comparison with the ones produced by the formerly proposed SA algorithm.