A Simulation-based Framework for the Economic evaluation of Flexible Manufacturing Systems

Due to the increasing market demand volatility, globalization of markets and shorter product life cycles, the importance of flexible manufacturing systems gain more and more importance across all industry sectors and sizes of companies. Especially, the increasing planning uncertainties concerning the product mix and volume lead to a growing demand for flexibility. In this context, methods for the economic evaluation of flexible manufacturing systems take a significant role in drawing meaningful conclusions, which allow the creation of an optimized level of flexibility. This paper presents a simulation-based framework for an assessment methodology in order to conduct an economic evaluation of flexible manufacturing systems. Within the developed framework, costs induced by flexibility are allocated activity-based according to their actual cause. The identification of flexibility-induced cost and their causes, provide an overall improved cost transparency. Based on this, target-oriented optimization can be applied more effectively.