Changcheng Wan

Cloud manufacturing (CMfg) is a new manufacturing mode formed by the integration of information technology and communication technology with manufacturing. As a core role in CMfg, the CMfg platform is responsible for decomposing a large number of tasks from demander and allocating them to available services. The scheduling requires comprehensive consideration of the relevance, complexity and dynamics of task and service. When the decomposable task is multi-composite, how to allocate the optimum services to multi-composite tasks is a tricky and important problem. To solve the issue, a hierarchical scheduling model for multi-composite tasks is proposed, which is divided into user-level scheduling and sublevel scheduling to reduce the scale and difficulty of scheduling. User-level scheduling achieves two-way matching between demander and provider based on various attributes. For the sublevel scheduling, an improved firefly genetic algorithm is created for multi-objective optimisation. A detailed analysis of the hierarchical scheduling strategy is performed by testing several different instances. Experimental results indicate that this strategy reduces the complexity than collective scheduling; and has a better comprehensive balance effect on multiple optimisation goals than sequential scheduling.

With the integration of new-generation information and communication technology (ICT) in the manufacturing industry, many advanced manufacturing modes have been proposed. Cloud manufacturing (CMfg) is one example which integrates manufacturing resources and the provision of on-demand services using new technologies, such as Internet of Things (IoT), Big Data and cloud computing. CMfg has experienced rapid development from its initial theory and technology to its application and has attracted considerable attention since its introduction in 2010. Many scholars in China have conducted significant research on CMfg. Therefore, it is significant to review the achievements from Chinese scholars to examine the current progress of CMfg research in China. This paper presents the definitions of CMfg found in the literature and summarizes the developments regarding eight dimensions of CMfg. Several successful implementations of CMfg in China are discussed and compared. Furthermore, the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) method is used to analyze the potential impacts of CMfg on the future development of the China manufacturing industry.