Reconfiguration of production systems using optimization and material flow simulation

Current market developments, such as intensifying volatility and rising demand for individualized products, require highly flexible and adaptable production systems. Reconfigurable production systems enable manufacturing companies to meet these market developments due to the ability of short-term scalability of capacities and order-specific adjustments of production resources for preserving high delivery performance and utilization rate. The vast complexity of such systems raises the demand for decision support systems. Therefore, this paper presents an innovative approach combining optimization and material flow simulation for developing and selecting optimized reconfiguration scenarios. A prototypical application is presented to demonstrate the feasibility of the approach.