Process Flexibility for Multiperiod Production Systems

Abstract

The classical process flexibility literature has mostly focused on single-period models as finding the optimal multiperiod policy is difficult because of the curse of dimensionality. In “Process Flexibility for Multiperiod Production Systems,” Cong Shi, Yehua Wei, and Yuan Zhong study the design of sparse flexibility in dynamic make-to-order environments. Leveraging theories from applied probability, they propose a notion of “generalized chaining,” which allows one to design effective sparse flexibility structures in regimes in which capacity slacks are low. They then construct a structure that performs asymptotically close to full flexibility with only m + n arcs, where m and n represent the number of plants and product types, while also demonstrating that m + n is tight, that is, constructing systems in which even the best flexibility structure with m + n − 1 arcs cannot achieve the same asymptotic performance. These results provide insights into how design principles for process flexibility extend beyond the classical single-period model.