Application of Analytic Network Process in Lean Production System Justification

Now a day's companies are in great pressure to reduce costs, increase flexibility, improve quality and cut down on lead times. Companies are thus turning their attention to implement lean. This has created urgency to apply new tools and techniques to reduce various wastes. This paper deals with applying analytic network process (ANP) to select the best manufacturing process in an industry. Lean manufacturing (LM) is one of the techniques which is used in the manufacturing industries especially in large and reputed industries. Most of the medium and small-scale industries are not aware of lean manufacturing. This paper aims to show the advantages of lean manufacturing over computer integrated manufacturing system and traditional manufacturing system by comparing among the alternative. For that we have chosen seven criteria's to compare these manufacturing systems with lean manufacturing system. ANP is a mathematical tool which is used to make decisions when the situations are in critical. The decision is made among the three manufacturing system and it shows that the lean manufacturing is best among the alternative. This result is done by using super decision software.