Provided herein are automated article dispensing systems having inventory management capabilities, and methods for managing inventory of articles in automated dispensing systems. In particular, the systems and methods disclosed herein utilize an inventory management assembly which includes one or more sensors configured to detect directly or indirectly one or more parameters related to quality and/or quantity the articles and an inventory management processing module configured to compute inventory related data based at least on the one or more parameters.

A system and method for controlling movement of transporting devices arranged to transport containers, the containers being stored in stacks arranged in a facility. A facility having pathways arranged in a grid-like structure above stacks, the transporting devices being configured to operate on the grid-like structure. A control unit configured to determine at least one task to be performed by at least one transporting device, wherein the at least one task is determined based on at least one of: transporting device battery condition, transporting device damage, transporting device maintenance issues, and transporting device service issues.

A positioning method and system, an electronic device, and a computer-readable storage medium are provided. The positioning method comprises: a first device controls its operating state to be a first operating state (101); the first device in the first operating state is in signal communication with at least one second device in a second operating state to obtain a first communication parameter during a signal communication process (102); obtain a first position parameter of the at least one second device with respect to the first device on the basis of the first communication parameter (103); the first device sends to each second device the first position parameter of the at least one second device with respect to the first device (104). According to the positioning method and system, in a multi-device coordination task, the positioning of devices can be implemented by means of communication therebetween, so that the task is completed by means of ad hoc formation and coordination of multiple devices.

In order to enable to more appropriately determine operation contents when fluctuation in processing speed is great, a transfer operation control method includes: calculating an importance level of each predetermined transfer operation, based on at least one or more of a usage rate of an output buffer of a work station being a transfer source of the transfer operation, and the usage rate of an input buffer of the work station being a transfer destination of the transfer operation, determining, as a candidate for the transfer operation to be performed next, the transfer operation having the maximum importance level, and outputting transfer operation information including information of the work station being the transfer source and the work station being the transfer destination for the determined transfer operation.

According to various embodiments, a compactor arrangement (202) may have the following: a function module arrangement (1002), which is installed on a support framework (204a) above an empty-container transport device (202t), wherein the function module arrangement (1002) has: a module receptacle (1004) for receiving multiple function modules (1006), the multiple function modules (1006), which are designed to match the module receptacle (1004) such that the multiple function modules (1006) can each be selectively received in multiple configurations (1100c, 1100d, 1100e, 1100f) in the module receptacle (1004), at least one processor (1008) which is configured to ascertain an actual configuration of the multiple configurations (1100c, 1100d, 1100e, 1100f) and to operate the function module arrangement (1002) and/or the compactor arrangement (202) on the basis of the ascertained actual configuration.

An embodiment includes a plurality of transport modules forming a transport path on which a carriage that transports a workpiece travels, and a control unit that controls a position of the carriage on the plurality of transport modules based on a drive instruction, and the control unit corrects the drive instruction during carriage motion that is based on the drive instruction and stops the carriage.

A system and method for independently routing container-located vehicles to create different finished products are disclosed. The vehicles are independently routable along a track system to deliver the containers to at least one unit operation station. At least some of the vehicles have a unique route associated therewith that is assigned by a control system to facilitate simultaneous production of different finished products.

A workpiece processing system (1) includes a transfer robot (3), a control device (4) controlling operation of the transfer robot (3), and an operating part (5) performing a teaching operation to the transfer robot (3). The control device (4) has an approach point setter (6) setting in advance an approach point as a reference point for the transfer robot (3) to start operation to a workpiece processing device, a first program generator (7) generating a first program defining the operation of the transfer robot (3) from an operational zero point for the transfer robot (3) to the approach point, a second program generator (8) generating a second program defining the operation of the transfer robot (3) after the approach point based on the teaching operation, and a robot controller (9) controlling the operation of the transfer robot (3) in accordance with the first program and the second program.

A manufacturing management device includes a determination section configured to determine the necessity of maintenance on any of the multiple production devices during production by the production line; and a conveyance management section configured to stop loading circuit boards, at a predetermined time, onto a reference device among the multiple production devices when it is determined that maintenance is necessary, the reference device being positioned upstream in the production line from a maintenance target device having a cause for maintenance.

In order to improve the planning and implementation of the manufacture of a product in a manufacturing plant, the manufacturing plant is modeled via a machine network plan modeling the manufacturing plant as a network of manufacturing nodes, and the product to be manufactured being modeled via a product synthesis plan modeling the hierarchical structure of the product in the form of a tree of product synthesis nodes. The machine network plan and the product synthesis plan are linked with each other to form a manufacturing sequence, in which a manufacturing node of the machine network plan is selected for each operation node of the product synthesis plan, which selected manufacturing node carries out the manufacturing process to be carried out at the relevant operation node. The manufacturing sequence is carried out in the manufacturing plant via a system controller in order to produce the product.