Flexible manufacturing systems (FMS) represent a class of highly automated systems. The increased importance of these highly automated manufacturing systems to the survival of modern industries has resulted in increasing research efforts that address the many issues inherent in flexible manufacturing. However not one periodic publication has been established to serve the research needs of the growing audience of industrial academic and governmental persons becoming involved with flexible machining and flexible assembly systems. The aim of the journal is to provide a consolidated forum for the publication of original high-quality articles on all topics related to flexible manufacturing that heretofore have been dispersed throughout a wide body of literature. The scope of the journal includes analysis to support the design or control of FMSs in which a variety of part types are simultaneously produced using versatile resources. These can be reallocated to produce different part types or a different mix of part types without major delays or investment. A balanced discussion of both theoretical and applied issues may be found in this journal including such matters as decision models performance models managerial issues and industrial needs and applications. Finally the journal cuts across the fields of engineering and management to include operations management manufacturing engineering industrial engineering operations research and management science as they relate to FMS.