Development of Capability for Integrated Smart Production-Spare Part Warehouse System for SMEs in Fast-Moving Consumer Goods sector

To maximize productivity of SMEs in Fast-Moving-Consumer-Goods sector (SMEs-FMCG), reducing machinery’s downtime due to spare-parts unavailability is crucial. Data-integration is essential for smart-production capability-development, by enabling real-time optimization to increase productivity. Since data-integration solutions are costly while SMEs-FMCG have slim-profit margin, SMEs-FMCG have not adopted Data-integration in spare-parts warehousing. This study proposes an affordable approach for spare-parts inventory costs minimization while maximizing their availability for maintenance using real data. A Linear-Programming-Model was formulated/integrated with Warehouse-Management-Systems software to optimize number of spare-parts orders alongside order-quantity. This was applied to a baked-goods manufacturer, minimizing downtimes due to spare-parts unavailability and inventory cost.