On the ordering of optimal hedging points in a class of manufacturing flow control models

The optimal flow control policy of a single-product unreliable manufacturing system that must meet a constant demand rate is known to be a threshold type policy: safety production surplus levels called hedging points (thresholds) are associated with each discrete stochastic capacity state of the system and serve to protect the production process from uncertainty in future capacity availability. This correspondence extends and generalizes previous results on the ordering of optimal hedging points. The authors´ method is based on examining special properties of the Bellman optimality conditions of the underlying stochastic control problem