Method for fulfilling demands in a plan

A non-transitory computer-readable medium containing computer program code that, when executed by a processor, performs an operation for optimizing a plan for a semiconductor manufacturing environment, the operation comprising:

• A. receiving a plurality of demands for a plan of equipment utilization in the semiconductor manufacturing environment, wherein each demand of the plurality of demands relates to a part, quantity, or operation of an equipment utilized, wherein each demand has parameters specifying at least a set of manufacturing operations, a due date, user specified business logic or priority;
• B. assigning ranks to each of the demands based on the parameters and the user specified business logic;
• C. breaking the plurality of demands into sets of demands based on a predefined number and the assigned rank;
• D. optimizing the demands in a first set of demands to generate a strategy for fulfilling the demands in the first set of demands;
• E. applying one or more constraints to an optimization model to ensure the first set of demands are fulfilled in preference to the remaining sets of demands;
• F. creating a plan from operations A through E for utilizing manufacturing equipment in the semiconductor manufacturing environment;
• and
• G. executing the plan to direct the utilization of the manufacturing equipment in fulfillment of the demand.

A planning system for a semiconductor manufacturing environment, wherein the semiconductor manufacturing environment comprises a plurality of demands and one or more tools for processing the demands, the scheduling system comprising:

• at least one processor;
• and
• a memory containing a program that, when executed by the at least one processor, performs an operation for executing a plan for the semiconductor manufacturing environment, the operation comprising:
• A. receiving a plurality of demands for a plan of equipment utilization in the semiconductor manufacturing environment, wherein each demand of the plurality of demands relates to a part, quantity, or operation of an equipment utilized, wherein each demand has parameters specifying at least a set of manufacturing operations, a due date, user specified business logic or priority;
• B. assigning ranks to each of the demands based on the parameters and the user specified business logic;
• C. breaking the plurality of demands into sets of demands based on a predefined number and the assigned rank;
• D. optimizing the demands in a first set of demands to generate a strategy for fulfilling the demands in the first set of demands;
• E. applying one or more constraints to an optimization model to ensure the first set of demands are fulfilled in preference to the remaining sets of demands;
• F. creating a plan from operations A through E for utilizing manufacturing equipment in the semiconductor manufacturing environment;
• and
• G. executing the plan to direct the utilization of the manufacturing equipment in fulfillment of the demand.