Available online at www.sciencedirect.

com

Available ScienceDirect
online atonline
Available www.sciencedirect.com
at www.sciencedirect.com

ScienceDirect
Procedia CIRP 00 (2018) 000–000
ScienceDirect www.elsevier.com/locate/procedia

Procedia CIRP 00 (2017)

Procedia 000–000
CIRP 72 (2018) 953–960
www.elsevier.com/locate/procedia

51st CIRP Conference on Manufacturing Systems

Multi-agent-based 28thscheduling in cloudMay

CIRP Design Conference, manufacturing with dynamic task
2018, Nantes, France
arrivals
A new methodology to analyze the functional and physical architecture of
existing products
Yongkui forLihui
Liua,b*, an Wang
assembly
a
oriented
, Yuquan product
Wanga, Xi Vincent family identification
Wanga, Lin Zhangc
a
Department of Production Engineering, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
Paul Stief *, Jean-Yves Dantan, Alain Etienne, Ali Siadat
Center for Complex Systems, School of Mechano-Electronic Engineering, Xidian University, Xi’an 710071, China
b

c
School of Automation Science and Electrical Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China
École Nationale Supérieure d’Arts et Métiers, Arts et Métiers ParisTech, LCFC EA 4495, 4 Rue Augustin Fresnel, Metz 57078, France
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +0-000-000-0000 ; fax: +0-000-000-0000. E-mail address: yongkui@kth.se

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +33 3 87 37 54 30; E-mail address: paul.stief@ensam.eu

Abstract

Abstract
Scheduling is a critical means for providing on-demand manufacturing services in cloud manufacturing. Multi-agent technologies provide an
effective approach for addressing scheduling issues in cloud manufacturing, which, however, have rarely been used for solving the issue. This
Inpaper
today’s business
addresses environment,
scheduling issuestheintrend
cloudtowards more product
manufacturing using variety and customization
multi-agent technologies. A is unbroken.
multi-agentDue to this development,
architecture the in
for scheduling need of
cloud
agile and reconfigurable
manufacturing is proposed production systems
firstly. Then, emerged to cope
a corresponding with various
multi-agent modelproducts and product
is presented, families. Tomany-to-many
which incorporates design and optimize production
negotiations based
systems as well as
on an extended to choose
contract the optimal
net protocol and product matches,
takes into accountproduct
dynamicanalysis methods
task arrivals. are needed.
Simulation Indeed,
results mostthe
indicate of feasibility
the knownofmethods
the model aimand
to
analyze
approacha product or one product family on the physical level. Different product families, however, may differ largely in terms of the number and
proposed.
nature of components. This fact impedes an efficient comparison and choice of appropriate product family combinations for the production
system.
© 2018AThe new methodology
Authors. is proposed
Published by Elsevierto analyze
B.V. existing products in view of their functional and physical architecture. The aim is to cluster
these productsunder
Peer-review in new assembly oriented
responsibility product families
of the scientific for the
committee optimization
of the 51st CIRPof existing assembly
Conference lines and the
on Manufacturing creation of future reconfigurable
Systems.
assembly systems. Based on Datum Flow Chain, the physical structure of the products is analyzed. Functional subassemblies are identified, and
a functional analysis
Keywords: Cloud is performed.
manufacturing; Moreover,
scheduling; a hybrid functional and physical architecture graph (HyFPAG) is the output which depicts the
multi-agent
similarity between product families by providing design support to both, production system planners and product designers. An illustrative
example of a nail-clipper is used to explain the proposed methodology. An industrial case study on two product families of steering columns of
Nomenclature
thyssenkrupp Presta France is then carried out to give a first industrial evaluation𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙of the agent encapsulated
proposed approach. from 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
© 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. 𝑅𝑅𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 type of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝐸𝐸
Peer-review collection
under of all enterprises
responsibility of the scientific committee of the 28th CIRP Design Conference 2018.
𝐴𝐴𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 quantity of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝐼𝐼 number of enterprises
Keywords: Assembly; Design method; Family identification 𝑐𝑐𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 cost of unit amount of service 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 for unit time
𝑖𝑖 index of enterprises
𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 price of unit amount of service 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 for unit time
𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 enterprise 𝑖𝑖
𝛼𝛼𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 efficiency coefficient of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝐸𝐸𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 agent encapsulated from 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖
1. Introduction 𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟
of the𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 productreliability
range of
and𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
characteristics manufactured and/or
𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝑖𝑖 location of 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖
assembled
𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 inlocation of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙In this context, the main challenge in
this system.
Due𝑖𝑖 to reputation
𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅 the fastof development
𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 in the domain of modelling
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 and
profitanalysis
marginisofnow 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙not only to cope with single
𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆
communication
𝑖𝑖 collection
and an ongoingoffered
of services trend by of 𝐸𝐸digitization
𝑖𝑖 and products, a limited product range or existing product families,
𝑟𝑟 task arrival rate
digitalization,
𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑖𝑖 service transactionenterprises
manufacturing rules of 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖are facing important but also to be able to analyze and to compare products to define
𝑇𝑇 collection of all tasks
challenges
𝑠𝑠 in today’sof market
collection all typesenvironments:
of services a continuing new product families. It can be observed that classical existing
tendency towards reduction of product development times and 𝐽𝐽
product total are
families number of tasks
regrouped in function of clients or features.
𝑀𝑀 number of types of all services
shortened product lifecycles. In addition, there is an increasing 𝑗𝑗
However, index oforiented
assembly tasks product families are hardly to find.
𝑚𝑚 index of services
demand of customization, being at the same time in a global 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗On the product
𝑗𝑗th taskfamily level, products differ mainly in two
𝑠𝑠𝑚𝑚
competition with type
𝑚𝑚th of serviceall over the world. This trend,
competitors main
𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 characteristics: (i) the number
agent encapsulated from of𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗components and (ii) the
number of
𝐿𝐿𝑖𝑖 is inducing
which thetypes of services from
development offered by 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖to micro
macro type of components (e.g. mechanical, electrical, electronical).
𝐴𝐴𝐴𝐴𝑗𝑗 arrival date of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗
markets,
𝑖𝑖 results
indexin of diminished lot sizes
types of services duebyto𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖augmenting
offered Classical methodologies considering mainly single products
𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷𝑗𝑗 due date of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗
product
𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 varieties (high-volume
𝑙𝑙th type of servicestooffered
low-volume
by 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 production) [1]. or solitary, already existing product families analyze the
To cope with this augmenting variety as well as to be able to product structure on a physical level (components level) which
identify possible optimization potentials in the existing causes difficulties regarding an efficient definition and
2212-8271 ©system,
production 2018 The it
Authors. Publishedtobyhave
is important Elsevier B.V. knowledge
a precise comparison of different product families. Addressing this
Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the 51st CIRP Conference on Manufacturing Systems.

2212-8271©©2017
2212-8271 2018The
The Authors.
Authors. Published
Published by Elsevier
by Elsevier B.V. B.V.
Peer-review
Peer-review under
under responsibility
responsibility of scientific
of the the scientific committee
committee of the of theCIRP
28th 51stDesign
CIRP Conference
Conference2018.
on Manufacturing Systems.
10.1016/j.procir.2018.03.138
954 Yongkui Liu et al. / Procedia CIRP 72 (2018) 953–960
Author name / Procedia CIRP 00 (2018) 000–000 2

𝛼𝛼0 benchmark service efficiency coefficient to consumers over the Internet [2]. Scheduling, which refers to
𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 total required processing time using unit amount the process of allocating resources to tasks, and controlling and
of service with 𝛼𝛼0 optimizing task execution in a production process or
𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝑗𝑗 budget of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 manufacturing process, is one of the critical means for
𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 penalty per unit time for not completing 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 achieving the aim of cloud manufacturing. So far, scheduling in
within 𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷𝑗𝑗 cloud manufacturing has received some research interest [3].
𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑗𝑗 overall reliability of completing 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 However, there are some drawbacks with existing research. For
example, in cloud manufacturing, stakeholders such as
𝑁𝑁𝑗𝑗 number of subtasks 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 consists of providers and consumers are autonomous entities with different
𝑛𝑛 index of subtasks of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 objectives and preferences. These characteristics have rarely
𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 nth subtask of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 been considered in existing research work. There are a huge
𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 subtask structure of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 amount resources and services involved in a cloud
𝑟𝑟𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 required service type of 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 manufacturing system. The proposed approaches, which
worked for usually dozens or hundreds of services, are very
𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 due date of 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛
likely to fail to generate schedules within a reasonable time in
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 required processing time of 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 the presence of large-scale services. The cloud manufacturing
𝑢𝑢𝑢𝑢0 unit amount of service environment is highly dynamic and a great variety of
𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 budget of 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 unexpected disturbances may take place at any time such as
𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 required reliability of 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 machine breakdown, rush orders, logistics delay, etc. These
unpredictable real-time events usually have not been
𝐹𝐹𝐹𝐹𝑗𝑗 fictitious currency of 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗
considered in existing research. The proposed scheduling
𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 required processing time of remaining methods, heuristics and meta-heuristics, are usually static or
unprocessed subtasks of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 predictive, which cannot effectively adapt to the dynamic cloud
𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 remaining available time of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 before 𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷𝑗𝑗 manufacturing environment. In addition, most of currently
𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗𝑡𝑡 control coefficient for modulating 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 proposed scheduling approaches are centralized and
𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵 control coefficient for modulating 𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝑗𝑗 hierarchical, which is not consistent with the distributed nature
𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅 control coefficient for modulating 𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑗𝑗 of cloud manufacturing. As a result, scheduling in cloud
𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃 control coefficient for modulating 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 manufacturing calls for adaptive, decentralized, efficient,
dynamic, and flexible approaches.
𝜆𝜆1 control coefficient for modulating 𝐹𝐹𝐹𝐹𝑗𝑗
Multi-agent technologies provide an effective method for
𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑖𝑖 number of subtasks 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 is allowed to bid for addressing scheduling issues in cloud manufacturing [3,4].
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝑈𝑈𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 capability of 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 with respect to subtask 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 With multi-agent technologies, different stakeholders,
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 time for 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 to process 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 taking into account resources, services can be modeled as intelligent agents with
logistics time, waiting time and processing time specific objectives and preferences. The distributed nature of
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝑐𝑐𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 cost for 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 to process 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 taking into account multi-agent systems is also in line with that of a cloud
logistics cost and processing cost manufacturing system. By modeling a cloud manufacturing
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝜆𝜆𝑡𝑡 control coefficient for modulating 𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 system as a multi-agent system, a global schedule can be
𝜆𝜆𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 control coefficient for modulating 𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 obtained through communication, interaction, negotiation, and
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 cooperation among different types of agents. Distributing
𝜆𝜆𝑐𝑐 control coefficient for modulating 𝑐𝑐𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛
computing tasks to different agents can effectively increases
𝜆𝜆𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 control coefficient for modulating 𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑖𝑖 efficiency of producing schedules. In addition, the local
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝜆𝜆2 control coefficient for modulating 𝑈𝑈𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 autonomy allows agents to respond rapidly to various local
𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 logistics time per unit distance disruptions (e.g. machine breakdown) during task execution
𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ logistics time between 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 and 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖 ′ ,𝑙𝑙′ processes, thus increasing the efficiency, robustness, and
𝑑𝑑𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ distance between 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 and 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖 ′ ,𝑙𝑙′ flexibility of scheduling.
′ However, despite the aforementioned advantages of multi-
𝑊𝑊𝑗𝑗 𝑛𝑛,𝑛𝑛 weight of the intermediate product between
agent systems in addressing scheduling issues in cloud
consecutive subtasks 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 and 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛′
manufacturing, it has rarely been considered and used for
𝑐𝑐𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 cost for unit distance and unit weight
solving scheduling issues in cloud manufacturing. So far, only
𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 waiting time for a new subtask to be processed Ma et al. [5] used the multi-agent technology for addressing
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 time required for 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 to process 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 issues in cloud manufacturing. An improved resource mediator-
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 cost required for 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 to process 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 based contract net mechanism was proposed for achieving the
adaptive management and scheduling of cloud manufacturing
1. Introduction services. However, the work considered only a simple scenario
where the scheduling objective is to achieve the shortest
For the past seven years, cloud manufacturing as a new execution time. With the aim to apply multi-agent technologies
manufacturing paradigm has attracted a large amount of to solving scheduling in cloud manufacturing, this paper
research interest worldwide [1]. The aim of cloud proposes a multi-agent architecture for this problem. An
manufacturing is to deliver on-demand manufacturing services improved contract net protocol which is able to support many-
 Yongkui Liu et al. / Procedia CIRP 72 (2018) 953–960
Author name / Procedia CIRP 00 (2018) 000–000
to-many negotiation and deal with dynamic task arrivals is
proposed. Simulation results indicate the feasibility and
effectiveness of the scheduling approach proposed.
The rest of this paper is structured as follows. The next
section presents a brief literature review. Section 3 presents a
multi-agent architecture for scheduling in cloud manufacturing.
Section 4 describes a specific multi-agent model. Section 5
performs a case study to verify the feasibility of the proposed
approach. Finally, in Section 6, we discuss related issues and
conclude the paper.
2. Literature review
This section first briefly presents the current status of
research on scheduling in cloud manufacturing, and then gives
a brief review on research on multi-agent-based scheduling in
other manufacturing systems.
2.1. Scheduling in cloud manufacturing
Lartigau et al. [6] proposed a scheduling framework with the
specific consideration of resource service availability in cloud
manufacturing. Cheng et al. [7] addressed the scheduling of
multiple tasks with identical execution flows. Liu et al. [8]
proposed a model for multi-task oriented service composition
and scheduling in cloud manufacturing. Based on the model,
they further [9] investigated the workload-based multi-task
scheduling in cloud manufacturing. Zhang et al. [10] addressed
shop-floor scheduling base on non-cooperative game theory in
the context of cloud manufacturing.
Most of the research above is static or predictive scheduling.
Dynamic scheduling has also drawn some attention. Li et al.
[11] investigated collaborative scheduling technologies
between multiple geographically distributed job shops based on
dynamical resource capability services. Ma et al. [5] used
multi-agent technologies for addressing issues in cloud
manufacturing. An improved resource mediator-based contract
net mechanism was proposed for achieving the adaptive
management and scheduling of cloud manufacturing services.
2.2. Multi-agent-based scheduling in other manufacturing
systems
Multi-agent technologies have long been used for solving
manufacturing or production scheduling issues. Shen [12] gave
a comprehensive analysis of distributed manufacturing
scheduling using intelligent agents, including agent
encapsulation, coordinated and negotiation protocols, and
architecture, and decision schemes. Ouelhadj and Petrovic [3]
presented a survey of dynamic scheduling in manufacturing
systems, and pointed out that multi-agent systems are a very
promising technology for dynamic scheduling. Macchiaroli
and Riemma [13] proposed a negotiation scheme for
autonomous agent in job shop scheduling in which the spread
between parts proposals and resources offers drives an iterative
re-negotiation process to reach convergence. Xiang and Lee
[14] proposed an approach to dynamic scheduling of a more
generic and realistic manufacturing system (with multiple
product types, multiple/parallel multi-purpose machines, and
955
3
various dynamic disturbances) using multi-agent technologies
into which ant colony intelligence is incorporated. Similarly, in
a more recent work, Zhang and Wong [15] presents a hybrid
approach combining multi-agent negotiations with ant colony
optimization for flexible job shop scheduling/rescheduling
problems under dynamic environment involving different types
of disruptions such as rush order, job cancellation and machine
breakdown/repair. Wong et al. [16] developed an agent-based
approach for the dynamic integration of the process planning
and scheduling functions, in which selection and allocation of
manufacturing resources are achieved through negotiation
among part agents and machine agents. A hybrid contract net
protocol incorporating global control into decentralized
negotiations is developed, which enables multi-task many-to-
many negotiations. Zhang and Wang [17] addressed the
production scheduling problems in re-entrant manufacturing
systems by developing an effective way of formulating
production schedules. A multi-agent-based hierarchical
collaborative system consisting of a system layer, a machine
layer, and a material handling device layer is developed to
improve the efficiency of re-entrant manufacturing systems.
Wang et al. [18] presented a novel approach to implementing
cyber-physical systems using the combined strength of holons,
agents and function blocks.
From the brief literature review above, it is easy to see that
although multi-agent technologies have been widely used in
various manufacturing systems for the scheduling purpose, it
has rarely been used for solving scheduling issues in cloud
manufacturing. In fact, there are some major differences
between scheduling in cloud manufacturing and scheduling in
other manufacturing systems or environments (see [3] for
details). As a result, there is a need to explore multi-agent-
based approaches for effectively addressing scheduling
problems in cloud manufacturing, and this paper represents an
early effort in this regard. In this paper, we take into account
the characteristics of many-to-many scheduling, cloud service-
based scheduling, and involvement of wide-area logistics in
cloud manufacturing, and propose corresponding multi-agent-
based methods for solving scheduling issues in cloud
manufacturing.
3. Multi-agent architecture for scheduling in cloud
manufacturing
This section presents a concise multi-agent architecture for
scheduling in cloud manufacturing (Figs.1 and 2).
3.1 Different types of agents
 Enterprise agent (EA)
An EA is created when an enterprise registers to the cloud
manufacturing platform and removed from the system when
the enterprise exits from the cloud platform. The functions of
an EA are to: (1) obtain, manage and maintain all related
information (including static attribute information and dynamic
real-time information) about the enterprise it represents; (2)
establish transaction rules for the services (including both
manufacturing services and logistics services) owned by the
enterprise it represents; (3) communicate with the SAs
encapsulated from the services owned by the enterprise it
956 Yongkui Liu et al. / Procedia CIRP 72 (2018) 953–960
Author name / Procedia CIRP 00 (2018) 000–000 4

represents about service transaction rules. BAs act as intermediaries between SAs and TAs. There are
 Service agent (SA) a number of BAs in a cloud manufacturing platform. The
A SA is created for each service, which is encapsulated from functions of a BA include: (1) accepting task announcement
either a single resource (such as a machine, a robot, etc.) or a from the TA that selects it as an broker and storing related
group of resources (e.g. a group of machines). The functions of information; (2) indicating the tasks for which it acts as an
a SA are to: (1) obtain, manage and maintain all information broker; (3) accepting bids from the SAs that intend to bid for
(including static attribute information and dynamic real-time the tasks it represents, preliminarily processing the bids (i.e.
status information) of the service it stands for; (2) register to filtering out the bids that do not satisfy the requirements and
the SeMA; (3) submit bids to TAs through a BA, which is constraints of its TA), and transmitting filtered bids to related
selected among all BAs randomly or according to their loads TAs; (3) transmitting confirmation information from TAs to
(e.g. the number of tasks for which it acts as an broker); (4) SAs; (4) transmitting commitments from SAs to TAs. The aim
wait for offer confirmation from TAs through the selected BA for introducing BAs is to increase the efficiency of
and select the best offer; (5) send its commitment to its BA and coordination and negotiation by reducing amounts of
record the TA selected; (6) execute tasks according to the communication messages between SAs and TAs.
notification from the SMA; (7) communicate with the ESMA  Task agent (TA)
about SA operation status. A TA is created for each task. A TA is created when a task
is submitted to the system and removed from the system when
the task is completed. The functions of a TA include: (1)
maintaining all the information about the task it represents
(such as its subtasks and their precedence relationship); (2)
Order/task Order/task Order/task contacting the TDA for decomposition; (3) registering to a
Agent Agent Agent TMA; (4) announcing requests for bids to the selected BA; (5)
accepting bids of SAs from the selected BA; (6) sending
confirmation to desired SAs through the selected BA; (7)
Broker Agent Broker Agent Broker Agent waiting for commitments from SAs through its BA and
selecting the optimal SA; (8) communicating with the SMA
about task execution status.
Service Service Service Service Service Service  Task decomposition agent (TDA)
Agent Agent Agent Agent Agent Agent
The function of the TMA is to decompose each task into a
number of subtasks by interacting with the knowledge
Enterprise Agent Enterprise Agent Enterprise Agent management agent. There can be more than one TDA in the
system.
 Task management agent (TMA)
The function of the TMA is to maintain a directory of TAs.
There can be more than one TMA in the system.
 Knowledge management agent (KMA)
Fig.1. Overall multi-agent architecture for scheduling in cloud manufacturing
(for brevity, some agents performing management functions are not shown, The function of the KMA is to provide relevant knowledge
see Fig.2 for details). necessary for task decomposition (such as processing
knowledge). There can be more than one KMA in the system.
Task decomposition Knowledge  Negotiation management agent (NMA)
agent management agent The main function of the NMA is to manage the details of
the negotiation process, including: (1) managing the way task
Task management are announced (e.g. one by one or following a specified priority
Task agents
agent or all TAs request for bids at the same time); (2) managing how
many tasks a SA is allowed to bid for; (3) managing the levels
Negotiation Scheduling (task level or subtask level) at which negotiations take place.
Broker agents
management agent management agent There can be more than one NMA in the system.
 Scheduling management agent (SMA)
Service agents Enterprise and The main function of the SMA is to monitor and manage the
service management entire scheduling process in collaboration with SAs, TAs,
agent TMA, and ESMA, including: (1) receiving real-time data and
Enterprise agents
information about tasks, enterprises and associated services,
logistics; (2) scheduling tasks onto selected SAs according to
the schedule generated; (3) managing the scheduling process
Fig.2. Interaction and communication among different types of agents. (e.g. triggering a re-negotiation process when disturbances
occur). There can be more than one SMA in the system.
 Enterprise and service management agent(s) (ESMA)
The main function of the ESMA is to maintain a directory of 4. A multi-agent model for scheduling in cloud
EAs and SAs, respectively. Given that there are numerous manufacturing
enterprises and large-scale services in a cloud manufacturing
system, there can be more than one ESMA in the system. This section proposes a specific multi-agent model for a
 Broker agents (BAs) cloud manufacturing system.
 Yongkui Liu et al. / Procedia CIRP 72 (2018) 953–960 957
Author name / Procedia CIRP 00 (2018) 000–000 5

 EAs and SAs and SAs through BAs. Each TA 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 is allowed to announce
Consider a cloud manufacturing system involving 𝐼𝐼 its subtasks sequentially to the SAs through the associated BA
enterprise 𝐸𝐸 = {𝐸𝐸1 , ⋯ , 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 , ⋯ , 𝐸𝐸𝐼𝐼 } (1 ≤ 𝑖𝑖 ≤ 𝐼𝐼) . Each at each time step. The content in the request of 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 for bids
enterprise 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 is encapsulated into an EA, namely 𝐸𝐸𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 , which from SAs includes mainly its fictitious currency and associated
is responsible for maintaining all relevant information about 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 , constraints. The fictitious currency 𝐹𝐹𝐹𝐹𝑗𝑗 of 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 can be
including its location 𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝐿𝑖𝑖 , reputation 𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑖𝑖 , the set of services calculated as follows:
offered 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖 , as well as the rules 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑖𝑖 established for 𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 𝑡𝑡 𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵 𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅
transaction of 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 ’s services. 𝐹𝐹𝐹𝐹𝑗𝑗 = × (𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡ℎ 𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 × 𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡ℎ 𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗 𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝑗𝑗
× 𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡ℎ 𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗 𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑗𝑗
×
𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅
There are 𝑀𝑀 types of manufacturing services 𝑠𝑠 = 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃

{𝑠𝑠1 , ⋯ , 𝑠𝑠𝑚𝑚 , ⋯ , 𝑠𝑠𝑀𝑀 } (1 ≤ 𝑚𝑚 ≤ 𝑀𝑀) in total in the entire cloud
manufacturing system. Each enterprise 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 offers 𝐿𝐿𝑖𝑖 ( 1 ≤
𝐿𝐿𝑖𝑖 ≤ 𝑀𝑀 ) types of manufacturing services 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖 =
{𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,1 , ⋯ , 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 , ⋯ , 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝐿𝐿𝑖𝑖 } (1 ≤ 𝑙𝑙 ≤ 𝐿𝐿𝑖𝑖 ), a SA 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 is created for
each type of service 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 , which is responsible for managing
and maintaining all attribute information of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 , including its
type 𝑅𝑅𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 , quantity 𝐴𝐴𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 , cost 𝑐𝑐𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 and price 𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 of unit amount
of service for unit time, efficiency coefficient 𝛼𝛼𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 , reliability
𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 and location 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 (which is identical to the location of
𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 ). All SAs encapsulated from services of 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 are managed by
𝐸𝐸𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 . Apart from the service attributes above, 𝐸𝐸𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 has an
aspiration on the profit margin of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 , i.e. only the profit
margin exceeds a threshold 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 can resource transactions
proceed. With the introduction of 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 , the relationship
between 𝑐𝑐𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 and 𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 can be expressed as follows:
𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 = 𝑐𝑐𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 × (1 + 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 ) (1)
 TAs
We consider the scenario where tasks arrive at the system
dynamically over time. Tasks are labelled sequentially
according to the order they enter the system, i.e. 𝑇𝑇 =
{𝑇𝑇1 , 𝑇𝑇2 , ⋯ , 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 , ⋯ } (1 ≤ 𝑗𝑗 ≤ 𝐽𝐽) . TA 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 is created
dynamically when task 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 arrives at the system and deleted
after 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 is completed. For 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 , the following attributes are
considered, including the arrival date 𝐴𝐴𝐴𝐴𝑗𝑗 , due date 𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷𝑗𝑗 , total
required processing time 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 for using unit resource with the
benchmark efficiency coefficient 𝛼𝛼0 (𝛼𝛼0 is the benchmark
efficiency coefficient, which represents the mean efficiency of
a specific type of social manufacturing resources/services), the
budget 𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝑗𝑗 , the penalty 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 per unit time for not
completing 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 within the due date, and the overall reliability
𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑗𝑗 of completing 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 .
𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 can be decomposed into 𝑁𝑁𝑗𝑗 subtasks 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆 =
{𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,1 , ⋯ , 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 , ⋯ , 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑁𝑁𝑗𝑗 } (1 ≤ 𝑛𝑛 ≤ 𝑁𝑁𝑗𝑗 ) with a specific subtask
structure 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 . For 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 , the following attributes are
considered, including required service type 𝑟𝑟𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 , due date 𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 ,
required processing time 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 using unit service 𝑢𝑢𝑢𝑢0 with the
benchmark efficiency coefficient 𝛼𝛼0 , the budget (i.e. the upper
limit of processing cost) 𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 , and the lower limit of
reliability 𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 . 𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 and 𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 can be calculated as
follows:
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛
𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 = 𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷𝑗𝑗 (2)
𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛
𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 = 𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝑗𝑗 (3)
𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃 𝑗𝑗
As a result, 𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝑗𝑗 , and 𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑗𝑗 can be calculated as follows.
𝑁𝑁𝑗𝑗
𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝑗𝑗 = ∑𝑘𝑘=1 𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑏𝑗𝑗,𝑘𝑘 (4)
𝑁𝑁𝑗𝑗
𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑗𝑗 = ∏𝑘𝑘=1 𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑗𝑗,𝑘𝑘(5)
 Negotiation protocol
Schedules are generated through negotiations between TAs
𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡ℎ 𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 ) × 𝜆𝜆1 (6)
𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟
where 𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗 is the required processing time of the unprocessed
subtasks of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 , 𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅 is the remaining available time of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 ,
which is defined as 𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅 = 𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷𝑗𝑗 − 𝑡𝑡𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐 (𝑡𝑡𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐𝑐 represents the
current time). 𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗𝑡𝑡 , 𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵 , 𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅 , and 𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑁𝑁 are control
coefficients introduced to modulate 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 , 𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝐵𝑗𝑗 , 𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑗𝑗 , and
𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟
𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 . The first term in Eq. (6) characterizes the urgency
𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅
of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 . A tasks with a longer required processing time and a
short available time is more urgent, and thus can attract more
bids so as to be completed as soon as possible. The terms in the
bracket describe the influence of the total processing time,
budget, reliability requirement, and penalty. The rational is that
a task with a longer processing time, a higher budget, a higher
execution reliability requirement, and a higher penalty should
be completed with a higher priority.
In each round of bidding, 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 is allowed to bid for 𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑖𝑖
subtasks through the BAs, and it simply selects the tasks with
top 𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑖𝑖 fictitious currency (if the number of available tasks
is greater than 𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑖𝑖 ) or all tasks (when the number of
available tasks is smaller than 𝑁𝑁𝑜𝑜𝐵𝐵𝑖𝑖 ). The content of a bid
includes its overall utility and other details such as processing
time, price, and reliability. SAs are not allowed to send their
bids to the TAs directly. Instead, they need to first send their
bids to the BAs. The BAs are responsible for screening out the
unqualified bids (i.e. bids with a processing time that exceeds
the due date, the processing price that exceeds the budget, and
a lower reliability smaller than required reliability).
The capability of 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 with respect to subtask 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 of 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗
can be calculated as follows:
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝜆𝜆𝑡𝑡 /𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝜆𝜆𝑐𝑐 /𝑐𝑐𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛
𝑈𝑈𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 = (𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡ℎ × 𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡ℎ 𝜆𝜆𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 × 𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡ℎ ×
𝜆𝜆𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅 𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑖𝑖
𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡𝑡ℎ ) × 𝜆𝜆2 (7)
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
where 𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 , ,
and 𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 are the time, cost, and reliability
𝑐𝑐𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛
for 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 to process 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 , and 𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑖𝑖 is the reputation of 𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 .
𝜆𝜆𝑡𝑡 , 𝜆𝜆𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 , 𝜆𝜆𝑐𝑐 , 𝜆𝜆𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅𝑅 , and 𝜆𝜆2 are associated control coefficients
introduced to modulate the utility of 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 with respect to 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 .
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
It should be noted that 𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 represents the time it will take
for 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 to complete 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 , including logistics time, waiting
time and processing time. Similarly, 𝑐𝑐𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
also include logistics
cost and processing cost. Regarding logistics, without loss of
generality, we can assume that there is only one type of
logistics service in the cloud manufacturing system, and the
logistics time for unit distance is 𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 . Hence, the logistics time
𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ between 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 and 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖 ′ ,𝑙𝑙′ with distance 𝑑𝑑𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ can be
computed as:
𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ = 𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙× 𝑑𝑑𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ (8)
The logistics cost is concerned with not only the distance
but also the weight of the intermediate product between
958 Yongkui Liu et al. / Procedia CIRP 72 (2018) 953–960
Author name / Procedia CIRP 00 (2018) 000–000 6

consecutive subtasks during the task execution process. negotiation process, 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 announces its subtasks sequentially
Assume that the weight of the intermediate product between and requests for bids from SAs through its associated broker
′
consecutive subtasks 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 and 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛′ is 𝑊𝑊𝑗𝑗 𝑛𝑛,𝑛𝑛 , and the cost for agent. After SAs receive the subtask information from TAs,
unit distance and unit weight is 𝑐𝑐𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 , then the logistics cost is: they are allowed to bid for all the matched and associated tasks.
′ After a TA receives bids from SAs through BAs, it chooses the
𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ = 𝑐𝑐𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 × 𝑑𝑑𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ × 𝑊𝑊𝑗𝑗 𝑛𝑛,𝑛𝑛 (9) SA with the highest utility and then sends the confirmation to
provided services 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 and 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖 ′ ,𝑙𝑙′ undertake subtasks 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 and the best SA through the associated BA. A SA may receive more
𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛′ , respectively. than one offer, and in this case, the SA simply selects the offer
The waiting time 𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 is determined by the queuing time, from the TA with the highest fictitious currency and sends its
which takes into account all the subtasks in the buffer of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 . commitment to it. If no commitment is received for a TA, then
For the sake of simplicity, we consider only existing subtasks negotiation for the current subtask will continue in the next
in the buffer of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 and do not take into account the bids round of bidding. After all tasks have found services for their
submitted but without confirmation from TAs. In this way, we subtasks, the negotiation process ends. The scheduling result is
assume that the subtask 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 will be addressed after shown in Fig.3, and the common parameters, enterprise and
completing all subtasks in the buffer of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 , and the waiting service parameters, and task and their subtasks’ parameters for
time in this case can be calculated as follows: the simulation experiment are shown in Tables 1-4. Note that
𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 = ∑𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 ∈Ω 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
(10) in this case study, for the sake of simplicity but without loss of
where Ω represents all tasks in the buffer of 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 . The time for generality, enterprise reputation (Table 2), logistics, task
budget constraint, reliability constraint, and penalty are not
𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 to complete subtask 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 can be calculated as follows:
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 𝑢𝑢𝑢𝑢0 ×𝛼𝛼0 ×𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 considered, and all tasks are assumed to consist of three
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 = (11) sequentially executed subtasks (Table 4).
𝐴𝐴𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 ×𝛼𝛼𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
and the price for 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 to process subtask 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 can therefore
Table 1. Common parameters.
be calculated as:
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 Variable Value Unit
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 = 𝐴𝐴𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 × 𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 × 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 (12)
As a result, 𝛼𝛼0 1.0
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝑡𝑡𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 = 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ + 𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑊𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 + 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛
𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
(13) 𝑢𝑢𝑢𝑢0 1.0

= 𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝑐𝑐𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛+ 𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑖𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙′ ,𝑙𝑙′ (14)𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝜆𝜆1 1.0

After 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 receives bids from the BAs, it evaluates the 𝜆𝜆2 1.0
capabilities of all SAs, chooses the SA with the highest utility, 𝜆𝜆𝑗𝑗𝑡𝑡 0.03
and then sends the confirmation to the best SA through the 𝜆𝜆𝑡𝑡 0.05
associated BA. A SA may receive more than one offer. In this 𝜆𝜆𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟 0.5
case, the SA simply selects the task with the highest fictitious
𝜆𝜆𝑐𝑐 15
currency and sends its commitment to the TA. If no
commitment is received for a TA, then negotiation for the 𝐴𝐴𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 [20,50]
current subtask will continue in the next round of bidding. If 𝑐𝑐𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 [15,30] Yuan(¥)
there are more subtasks for a task, then negotiation will also 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 [0.3,1.0]
continue for the next subtask at the next time step.
𝛼𝛼𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 [0.5,1.5]
At the same time, tasks are executed under the unified
management of the SMA. During the task execution process, 𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 [0.8,1.0]
the SMA schedules tasks onto services according to the 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗 [20,30] Time step
negotiation result, and monitors the execution process. If 𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷𝑗𝑗 3*𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗
disruptions (e.g. machine breakdown or rush orders) occur,
𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 [5,10]
schedules need to be updated such as schedule repairing or
completely rescheduling. Due to the space limit of this paper, Table 2. Enterprise and service parameters (due to the limited space, only
we do not considered such disturbances here and leave it in our parameters of five among 15 enterprises are shown).
future work.
𝐸𝐸𝑖𝑖 𝑆𝑆𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 𝑅𝑅𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 𝐴𝐴𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 𝑐𝑐𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 𝛼𝛼𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙 𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑟𝑖𝑖,𝑙𝑙

5. Case study 𝑆𝑆1,1 C 43 27 0.74 1.35 0.94

𝑆𝑆1,2 P 41 30 0.73 0.98 0.82
This section presents a case study in which 15 enterprises 𝐸𝐸1
𝑆𝑆1,3 T 32 24 0.92 1.10 0.94
offer seven types of industrial robot resources (see Table 2 and
𝑆𝑆1,4 W 31 20 0.83 0.75 0.93
Fig.3), including welding (W), cutting (C), grinding (G),
𝑆𝑆2,1 P 42 21 0.95 1.14 0.95
painting (P), pick-and-place (PP), assembly (A), transfer (T) 𝐸𝐸2
robots. Tasks arrive continuously, and the arrival rate is subject 𝑆𝑆2,2 W 33 28 0.72 0.74 0.97
to the Poisson distribution with a mean of 𝑟𝑟 time step (i.e. a 𝑆𝑆3,1 A 48 16 0.84 0.66 0.90
𝐸𝐸3
task arrives for every 𝑟𝑟 time steps averagely, see Table 3). 𝑆𝑆3.2 T 39 26 0.86 1.37 0.97
When task 𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 arrives at the cloud manufacturing system, TA 𝑆𝑆4,1 PP 35 18 0.40 0.73 0.92
agent 𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 is created dynamically, and then contract net 𝐸𝐸4
𝑆𝑆4,2 A 23 15 0.93 1.26 0.88
protocol-based negotiation can start immediately. During the
 Yongkui Liu et al. / Procedia CIRP 72 (2018) 953–960 959
Author name / Procedia CIRP 00 (2018) 000–000 7

C 8 10 15
P 1
E0
T
W
P
E1
W
A 13
E2
T 5
PP
E3
A
A 12
C 9
E4 P
T
W 2 3 14
C
E5 A 11
G 3 7 6 12 16
A 3
P
E6 T
G 5 4 8 11
W
PP 11
E7
P 4 10 15 16 14
PP 5 12
E8 A 2 8
W
T
E9
W
C
A 1
E10
T
PP
A 6 9
E11 P 7 13
T 4
PP 10 15
E12 T
W
PP 9 14
P 6
E13
T 1 16
W
C 2 13
P
E14
T
W 7
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91

Fig.3. Scheduling diagram for r=5.

𝑆𝑆5,1 A 39 30 0.53 1.31 0.96 𝑇𝑇9 C 60 10 PP 81 5 A 102 6

𝑆𝑆5,2 C 26 19 0.90 0.66 0.92 𝑇𝑇10 P 60 6 C 77 6 PP 94 5

𝑇𝑇11 PP 76 10 G 102 6 A 128 10
𝐸𝐸5 𝑆𝑆5,3 P 43 29 0.92 1.23 0.96
𝑇𝑇12 A 71 5 G 91 7 PP 111 8
𝑆𝑆5,4 T 47 20 0.76 0.61 0.90
𝑇𝑇13 C 75 9 P 95 5 A 115 6
𝑆𝑆5,5 W 49 17 0.31 1.02 0.91 𝑇𝑇14 PP 81 9 W 103 7 P 125 6
𝑇𝑇15 P 86 5 PP 111 10 C 136 10
Table 3. Task parameters.
𝑇𝑇16 P 92 6 T 116 8 G 140 10
𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 𝐴𝐴𝐴𝐴𝑗𝑗 𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷𝑗𝑗 𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑗𝑗
As shown in Fig.3, the average completion time, average
𝑇𝑇1 0 63 21 cost, and average reliability for all tasks are 23 time steps,
𝑇𝑇2 0 78 26 4139.34 yuan, and 0.74, respectively. The total completion
𝑇𝑇3 0 69 23 time for the 16 tasks is 91 time steps.
𝑇𝑇4 0 72 24
6. Conclusion
𝑇𝑇5 0 66 22
𝑇𝑇6 8 89 27
This paper addressed multi-agent-based scheduling issue in
𝑇𝑇7 12 87 25 cloud manufacturing. A scheduling-oriented multi-agent
𝑇𝑇8 21 93 24 architecture for cloud manufacturing was proposed. The roles
𝑇𝑇9 39 102 21 of different types of agents and their interaction relationship
𝑇𝑇10 43 94 17
were analyzed in detail. Then, a specific multi-agent model for
scheduling in cloud manufacturing was proposed. In this model,
𝑇𝑇11 50 128 26
the traditional contract net protocol was extended in
𝑇𝑇12 51 111 20 combination with the characteristics of cloud manufacturing to
𝑇𝑇13 55 115 20 allow many-to-many negotiations between SAs and tasks
𝑇𝑇14 59 125 22 agents. Moreover, dynamic task arrivals were also considered.
𝑇𝑇15 61 136 25 A case study of scheduling industrial robot resources was
presented to demonstrate the feasibility and effectiveness of the
𝑇𝑇16 68 140 24
model proposed. Due to the space limit, in this paper only
Table 4. Subtask parameters. preliminary simulation results were provided and some
attributes were not considered. In the future, we will consider
𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,1 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,2 𝑠𝑠𝑗𝑗,3
𝑇𝑇𝑗𝑗 more attributes of enterprises, services and tasks, more
𝑟𝑟𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑟𝑟𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑟𝑟𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑑𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛 𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑝𝑗𝑗,𝑛𝑛
complex agent negotiation protocols, as well as occurrence of
𝑇𝑇1 T 21 6 P 42 10 A 63 5 various real-time events (such as robot breakdown and rush
𝑇𝑇2 W 26 10 C 52 9 A 78 7 tasks).
𝑇𝑇3 G 23 7 A 46 7 W 69 9
𝑇𝑇4 P 24 10 T 48 6 G 72 8 References
𝑇𝑇5 G 22 5 PP 44 8 T 66 9
𝑇𝑇6 P 35 9 A 62 9 G 89 9 [1] Zhang L, Luo Y, Tao F, Li BH, Ren L, et al. Cloud manufacturing: a new
𝑇𝑇7 G 37 8 W 62 10 P 87 7 manufacturing paradigm. Enterprise Information Systems, 2014;8(2):167-
𝑇𝑇8 C 45 8 G 69 9 A 93 7 187.
960 Yongkui Liu et al. / Procedia CIRP 72 (2018) 953–960
Author name / Procedia CIRP 00 (2018) 000–000
[2] Xu X. From cloud computing to cloud manufacturing. Robotics and
computer-integrated manufacturing, 2012;28(1):75-86.
[3] Liu Y, Wang L, Wang XV, Xu X, Zhang L. Scheduling in cloud
manufacturing: state-of-the-art and research challenges. International J
ournal of Production Research, 2018, DOI: 10.1080/00207543.2018.14
49978.
[4] Ouelhadj D, Petrovic S. A survey of dynamic scheduling in manufa
cturing systems. Journal of Scheduling, 2009;12(4):417-431.
[5] Ma J, et al., Research on manufacturing resource cloud integration meta
modeling and cloud-agent service scheduling. China Mechanical
Engineering, 2014;25(7):917-923.
[6] Lartigau J, Xu X, Nie L, Zhan D. Cloud manufacturing service composition
based on QoS with geo-perspective transportation using an improved
Artificial Bee Colony optimisation algorithm. International Journal of
Production Research, 2015;53(14):4380-4404.
[7] Cheng Z, Zhan D, Zhao X, Wan H. Multitask oriented virtual resource
integration and optimal scheduling in cloud manufacturing. Journal of
Applied Mathematics, 2014;2014: 369350.
[8] Liu Y, Xu X, Zhang L, Tao F. An Extensible Model for Multitask-Oriented
Service Composition and Scheduling in Cloud Manufacturing. Journal of
Computing and Information Science in Engineering, 2016;16(4):041009.
[9] Liu Y, Xu X, Zhang L, Wang L, Zhong R. Y. Workload-based multi-task
scheduling in cloud manufacturing. Robotics and Computer-Integrated
Manufacturing, 2017;45:3-20.
8
[10] Zhang Y, Wang J, Liu S, Qian C. Game Theory Based Real‐Time Shop
Floor Scheduling Strategy and Method for Cloud Manufacturing.
International Journal of Intelligent Systems, 2017;32(4):437-463.
[11] Li JS, Wang AM, Tang CT, Lu ZB. Distributed coordination scheduling
technology based on dynamic manufacturing ability service. Computer
Integrated Manufacturing Systems, 2012;18(7):1563-1574.
[12] Shen W. Distributed Manufacturing Scheduling Using Intelligent Agents.
IEEE Intelligent Systems, 2002;17(1):88-94.
[13] Macchiaroli R, Riemma S. A negotiation scheme for autonomous agents
in job shop scheduling. International Journal of Computer Integrated
Manufacturing, 2002;15(3):222-232.
[14] Xiang W, Lee HP. Ant colony intelligence in multi-agent dynamic
manufacturing scheduling. Engineering Applications of Artificial
Intelligence, 2008;21(1):73-85.
[15] Zhang S, Wong TN. Flexible job-shop scheduling/rescheduling in
dynamic environment: a hybrid MAS/ACO approach. International Journal
of Production Research, 2017;55(11):3173-3196.
[16] Wong TN, Leung CW, Mak KL, Fung RY. Dynamic shopfloor scheduling
in multi-agent manufacturing systems. Expert Systems with Applications,
2006;31(3):486-494.
[17] Zhang J, Wang X. Multi-agent-based hierarchical collaborative
scheduling in re-entrant manufacturing systems. International Journal of
Production Research, 2016;54(23):7043-7059.
[18] Wang L, Haghighi A. Combined strength of holons, agents and function
blocks in cyber-physical systems. Journal of Manufacturing Systems,
2016;40:25-34.