Solving dynamic facility layout problem using a hybridized heuristic dynamic programming approach

Today’s market volatility shortens product lifecycles and drives constant changes in product mix and demand. Changes in product mix and demand necessitate, in turn, changes to the shopfloor layout. The dynamic facility layout problem (DFLP) addresses layout development over multiple periods, with rearrangements from one period to another. To optimize the DFLP using dynamic programming (DP), the DP state space should be restricted as the problem is NP-hard. Therefore, a two-phased hybridized solution algorithm is being proposed and developed in this article. In the first phase, a heuristic approach is used to determine the set of layouts to be considered in each period. In the second phase, a metaheuristic approach is used to solve the recursive formulation of DP. A genetic algorithm (GA) searches for the best subsets of layouts, each represented by one chromosome. Notably, the GA incorporates a heuristic selection operator guided by a deep neural network algorithm. The best subset of layouts that results in the best multi-period layout plan is found throughout the different GA generations. The proposed method’s efficiency is statistically validated through rigorous statistical tests, affirming its superior performance, particularly for large-sized instances of the problem, and showcasing more efficient solutions.