Functional model for a capacity adaption system using flexibility options

The extensive fluctuations in demand during the past 2 years have challenged the flexibility of many companies to the limit. Furthermore, many experts believe that the demand will increasingly be volatile in the future. Companies have to adapt to these requirements by being more flexible and adapt their capacities faster and in a higher frequency. Within this paper, the functionality of a decision support system, based on the concept of capacity envelopes and methods of operations research, is shown. The system delivers a recommendation to the decision maker which flexibility options are to choose in order to adapt capacity to the actual demand causing minimal additional costs.