A tabu search heuristic for the component assignment problem in PCB assembly

Discusses the component assignment problem in PCB assembly, where assigning components to appropriate machines, in order to get a minimum assembly time for the assembly line, can be formulated as an integer linear programming model. In order to obtain the optimal solution to the component assignment problem, the branch‐and‐bound method can be applied. However, it is not efficient. Applies the tabu search heuristic to the component assignment problem. The procedure of the tabu search to the problem is presented, and a numerical example is provided. Finally, the performance of the tabu search is analyzed with the example.