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Master Production Scheduling for the Production Planning in the

Pharmaceutical Industry

Chapter · January 2015

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-662-47200-2_30

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 Master Production Scheduling for the Production
Planning in the Pharmaceutical Industry

Sivinee Wattitham*1, Tuanjai Somboonwiwat2, Suksan Prombanpong3

Department of Production Engineering, King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi,

126 Prachautit Rd. Bangmod, Thungkru, Bangkok 10400, Thailand
*1sivinee.vi@gpo.or.th; 2tuanjai.som@gmail.com;
3suksan.pro@gmail.com

Abstract. Pharmaceutical Industry is important because it manufactures the

product related to health and human life. Typically, a manufacturer must
adequately plan the production in order to meet the customer demand;
nevertheless, The Government Pharmaceutical Organization (GPO) does not
have the Master Production Scheduling (MPS). Therefore, this research presents
the business process redesign of the MPS for the tablet manufacturing process at
The Government Pharmaceutical Organization. The objective of this study is to
plan synchronized master production schedule of tableting, coating and packing
by the heuristic algorithm development for the priority setting of product items.
The MPS can be created the related start date to finish date scheduling in each
process of tablet production. This MPS methodology is then applied to example
data sets, resulting in the linkage MPS plans of all production units with all
products delivered on time.

1 Introduction

The Government Pharmaceutical Organization (GPO), a state enterprise under the

Ministry of Public Health is the main generic drug manufacturer in Thailand and it is
responsible for producing various products used in both government and private
hospitals and health care centers. Its main product is tablet dosage form which have
ratio 70% of over 200 items across all categories of production. The process flow of
tablet is the multi-process consists of compression, coating and packing; therefore, the
production planning is important to efficiently respond to customer demand and sale
order due date because it is related to the fact that these medicinal products deal with
health and human life [1]. Due to ever increasing of the customer demand, The GPO
has faced with backorder problems and must strive to meet the quantity and delivery
date required [2]. A production planner in the pharmaceutical manufacture usually is a
pharmacist without engineering background. The production plan must be equipped
with the personal skill and experience but without engineering knowledge.
Consequent, There is no simple algorithm available to use. [3].
The main tool to control product availability is the master production scheduling
(MPS) [4]. By using the beginning inventory and the sales forecast for a particular
end item, a planner can calculate the amount of production needed per period to meet
anticipated customer demand [5]. MPS describes what is to be produced and also
refers to the time in which the production is scheduled to be completed [6].
 There are several literatures in the area of production planning using the master
production schedule (MPS). James A. Hill et al. [7] proposed the modified design of
the MPS and the use of a sequence-dependent scheduling heuristic for a chemical
manufacturing can provide important improvements in changeover time and total
shortages in process industries with sequence-dependent changeovers. Apichart
Sonklin et al. [8] developed the MPS of the production planning and scheduling for
the plastic forming products used in the daily life to plan the production quantity and
time schedule for reduce items split order and its transportation cost from late
delivery. Ray Venkataraman and Jay Nathan [9] established a weighted integer goal‐
programming model for the development of a rolling horizon master production
schedule, under conditions of demand certainty, for a paint industry environment with
multiple production lines and minimum batch‐size production restrictions.
Different researchers have applied various heuristics for obtaining a valid and
realistic MPS. Few of these that can be mentioned here are Guilhereme E Vieira et al
[10] considered simulated annealing where overcoming the local optimum is the
limitation. Guilhereme E Vieira and F. Favaretto [11] proposes a practical heuristic
for the MPS creation which strongly impacts final product costs, a decisive measure
for being competitive. C.C.Chern, J.S.Hsieh [12] proposed multi-objective master
planning algorithm (MOMPA), for a supply chain network with multiple finished
products. Nevertheless, no research has been found that applies the MPS in the
pharmaceutical industry. Therefore, this paper presents a business process redesign of
the MPS for the tablet manufacturing process at The Government Pharmaceutical
Organization to be the coherence of tableting, coating and packing plan which can
improve all products delivery on time.

2 Methodology

2.1 Problem description

The process flow of tablet production is divided into 4 stages i.e. mixing,
compression, coating and packing respectively as shown in Fig. 1. Tablet dosage
form is classified into 2 type i.e. plain tablet and coated tablet (coating process is
required). The assignment task starts from the compression process which the mixing
process is assumed constant and the mixing machine is in the same line as
compression process. Once the materials are well amalgamated, the tablet will be
form by the punching machine and they will be coated and subsequently transferred
for packing and arranged into the box or container. Note that each processing step
must follow GMP/PICs (Good Manufacturing Product / Pharmaceutical Inspection
Co-Operation Scheme).

Fig. 1.Flow Chart of tablet manufacturing process

 Previously, the production planning of tablet manufacturing process is usually
conducted by experience and done by expert pharmacists. The planner generates a
monthly aggregate plan which has the information of quantity and product name. This
plan is sent to all production units as shown in Fig. 2. The non-linkage problem of
each production planning is frequently occurred and is typically difficult to protect
because of the missing of the Master Production Scheduling (MPS).

Fig. 2. The non-linkage problem of as-is plan

In this paper, tablet manufacturing at the GPO which produces altogether 142
items, requirement between 36,000 to 897,500,000 tablets per year and on average
order of 30-40 items per month. A considerable procedure for heuristic algorithm is
shown in Fig. 3. We begin by collecting the master data about each product and each
process and develop a heuristic algorithm for the priority setting of product items.
Next, we calculate the latest start and latest finish by the backward scheduling.
Finally, a heuristic algorithm for the MPS is designed.

Fig. 3. The procedure of Master production scheduling

2.2 Heuristic algorithm for the priority setting of product

The purpose of the algorithm is to classify each product item to Make to Order
(MTO) or Make to Stock (MTS) and ordering the item based on the priority setting
scenario. The flow chart of the algorithm is depicted in Fig. 4.

Fig. 4. Flow chart of the priority setting algorithm

 The procedure steps are as follows:
1. All considered product items must be start with the information seeking and
checking for production planning.
2. Classify each product item to Make to Order (MTO), named Group 1 or Make to
Stock (MTS), named Group 2.
3. Sort the items in Group 1 by the respective sale order due date.
4. Check the date having more than one product item. If yes, go to step 5. If no, go to
step 6.
5. If tie occurs, the importance level obtained from the priority setting scenario will
be used to break the tie that start with the product in the previous list, next, the
lesser remaining number of production batch and finally, prioritize by the net
margin.
6. Select the candidate and assign to the sequence items for the MPS.
7. Check whether all product items in Group 1 are completely ordered. If yes, go to
step 8; otherwise go to step 3.
8. Sort the items in Group 2 by the ascending Inventory Usage Ratio (IUR).
9. Check the IUR that the product has the same ratio. If yes, go to step 10. If no, go
to step 11.
10. If tie occurs, the importance level obtained from the priority setting scenario will
be used to break the tie again.
11. Select the candidate and assign to the sequence items for the MPS.
12. Check whether all product items in Group 2 are completely ordered. If yes, go to
finish; otherwise go to step 8.

2.3 Calculation of the latest start and latest finished date

Latest start date is calculated for each process of tablet production to ensure that the
latest finish of each step still comply the sale order due date. The delivery lead time of
all products is 3 days which is considered for this research. We set

LFij = LS(i+1)ij – 1 (1)

LSij = LFij – LTij + 1 (2)

Let define:

i Index of process; i = 1, 2, 3, 4 whereas;

1 = compression, 2 = coating, 3 = packing, 4 = delivery
j Index of product sequence ; j = 1, 2, 3,…J
LSij Latest start date of process i of sequence j
LFij Latest finished date of process i of sequence j whereas;
LF4j = Sale order due date
LT Lead time (Day/batch)

2.4 Heuristic algorithm for selecting the start date and finished date

The sequent items from the priority setting rule must to determine the start date and finished
date by the simplified algorithm. The start date of each process should start before the latest
start date and check its standard time with the available time. If the capacity is enough to
accommodate the finished date is the same day. If it is not enough, check again with the next
day until the sufficient available time is occurred. Repeat this algorithm for each step of all
product sequences as shown in Fig. 5.
 Fig. 5. The algorithm to choose start and finished date

3 Results

In this section a master production scheduling is presented. The algorithm is applied

to a case study for the production planning of tablets manufacturing on June 2014
which the as-is production plan specifically indicate required products and number of
batches as shown in Table 1.

Table 1. The as-is production plan on June 2014

No. Product code No. of lots No. Product code No. of lots
1 P001 3 18 P072 4
2 P002 10 19 P074 13
3 P003 32 20 P081 5
4 P004 70 21 P097 10
5 P005 8 22 P099 8
6 P006 10 23 P102 6
7 P024 8 24 P106 1
8 P037 8 25 P107 2
9 P042 13 26 P113 4
10 P043 2 27 P114 2
11 P049 15 28 P115 2
12 P050 20 29 P116 15
13 P054 9 30 P117 30
14 P055 5 31 P118 10
15 P059 18 32 P123 30
16 P060 8 33 P131 20
17 P071 33 Total - 434
 We prioritize the 33 products (434 lots) to 175 sequences by priority setting rule
as shown in Table 2. After that, the synchronized master production schedule of
tableting, coating and packing can be created the related start date to finished date
scheduling in each process as shown in Table 3.

Table 2. The product sequence on June 2014

Sequence Product code No. of lots Sale order due date

1 P055
2 P118
3 P002
4 P074
5 P074
6 P117
7 P042
8 P102
9 P097
. .
. .
. .
175 P054
1 09-Jun-14
1 11- Jun-14
1 13- Jun-14
1 13- Jun-14
1 15- Jun-14
2 15- Jun-14
1 16- Jun-14
1 16- Jun-14
1 16- Jun-14
. .
. .
. .
2 31- Jul-14

Table 3. The example of the master production schedule on June 2014 (to-be)

Tableting Coating Packing

Sequence Due date
S F S F S F
1 2-Jun-14 2-Jun-14 - - 5-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 09-Jun-14
2 2-Jun-14 2-Jun-14 4-Jun-14 4-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 11-Jun-14
3 2-Jun-14 2-Jun-14 - - 5-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 13-Jun-14
4 2-Jun-14 2-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 8-Jun-14 8-Jun-14 13-Jun-14
5 3-Jun-14 3-Jun-14 8-Jun-14 8-Jun-14 9-Jun-14 9-Jun-14 15-Jun-14
6 2-Jun-14 2-Jun-14 4-Jun-14 4-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 15-Jun-14
7 4-Jun-14 4-Jun-14 - - 5-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 16-Jun-14
8 4-Jun-14 4-Jun-14 - - 5-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 16-Jun-14
9 2-Jun-14 2-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 5-Jun-14 8-Jun-14 8-Jun-14 16-Jun-14
. . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . .
. . . . . . .
175 25-Jun-14 25-Jun-14 - - 26-Jun-14 26-Jun-14 31-Jul-14

4 Discussion

The master production schedule (to-be) on June 2014 can linkage the plan of all
production units with all products delivered on time whereas the experience planning
method (as-is) can scheduling on time only 80.65% of 434 batches. Moreover, the
study reveals that the total available time from the master production scheduling is
decreased by 3,755.40 hour or 26.30% and the manufacturer can know beforehand in
the production process problem because of the synchronized plan.
 5 Conclusion
This research paper shows an attempt to apply an industrial engineering technique in
pharmaceutical industry. It is shown that the simplified algorithm is one of the
potential and useful methods for problem solving.
Although master production scheduling (MPS) has been studied and used by both
academia and industries for quite a long time, the real complexity involved in making
a master plan when capacity is limited, when products have the flexibility of being
made at different production lines, and when performance goals are tight due to
specifications, quality, efficacy and safety, but also the economy, has not yet been
presented in the literature in a simple and practical way. Thus, the heuristic algorithm
is proposed to simplify this task and make it more efficient.

Acknowledgments. We would like to thank the Government Pharmaceutical

Organization for the financial support of this research and Production planning
division for the support data.

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