The past 1 and 2 of July, Brussels welcomed the Flexinet kick-off: Intelligent Systems Configuration Services for Flexible Dynamic Global Production Networks. This project, funded by the VII Framework Programme of the European Union, is framed within the research line named Factories of the Future.

With a duration of three years and a budget of more than € 5,500,000.00, the aim behind the project is getting more competitive manufacturing industries through the design of a production system that can be quickly, appropriately and efficiently reconfigured, to help industries to adapt to new business ideas or changes that affect their production chain. The metaphor employed is ‘to start a new business idea in the morning and have all required data and networks understood by the afternoon’.

With this objective in mind, the ITI and the other members of the consortium, led by the University of Loughborough, seek to obtain services that enable manufacturing companies to design and implement flexible interoperable networks and production systems.  With the support of an ontology-based framework, and taking into account environmental changes, these systems will evaluate different options to be reconfigured and quickly adapted to new production scenarios, making reasoned decisions to complex multi-faceted problems.