Capabilities, as defined in this paper, semantically describe the effects that manufacturing resources can cause in a specific context. For instance, a drilling machine offers the capa- bility to create a hole in a suitable material like wood or metal.

Weser, M., Bock, J., Schmitt, S., Perzylo, A., & Evers, K. (2020). An Ontology-based Metamodel for Capability Descriptions. Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Emerging Technologies And Factory Automation (ETFA). [DOI]

Capability is the inherent ability of a resource or system to perform change in the properties of materials, parts or assemblies, or to perform activities which may be required to change the properties of materials, parts or assemblies, in order to produce tangible products.

E. Järvenpää: Capability-based adaptation of production systems in a changing environment. Tampere, Tampere University of Technology. Dissertation, 2012. [Website der Uni Tampere]

A capability is a resource-instance neutral state transition system from a supply perspective. Unlike the skill, no effect is described for the capability. A capability has a name defined and standardized in an ontology. It contains a description of those parameter types that are changed from initial to final state, but not concrete parameter values. Like a skill, a capability can impose certain conditions on the initial and final state. A capability is resource instance-neutral but can be resource type-specific.

Glossary of BaSys 4.2 [Link to glossary document in sharepoint (not yet published)]

A capability is an implementation-independent potential of an Industrie 4.0 component to achieve an effect within a domain.

Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi). Details of the Asset Administration Shell - Part 1, 2020 [Plattform Industrie 4.0]