TOWARDS A SELF-FORMING BUSINESS NETWORKING

ENVIRONMENT

Claudia-Melania Chituc, Americo Lopes Azevedo

FEUP (Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto); INESC Porto

Address: INESC Porto - Campus da FEUP, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias 378, 4200-465 Porto, Portugal

Keywords: Business Networking, Plug-and-Do-Business Paradigm, Self-Forming Networked Organizations, Enterprise

Integration

Abstract: The rapid evolution of the markets and the changing client’s demands determined enterprises to a

dapt their

business from traditional business practices to e-business, and new forms of collaboration (such as supply

chain enterprises, extended enterprises or virtual enterprises) were created. Technologies such as Peer-to-

Peer, Web services, intelligent agents, Workflow become core technologies supporting enterprise

integration, streamlining transactions while supporting process coordination and consistency. The aim of

this paper is to concisely present some relevant business integration reference models, frameworks,

standards and technologies, and to propose an approach towards the development of a conceptual

framework for a self-forming business networking environment based on Plug-and-Do Business paradigm.

1 INTRODUCTION

Nowadays, in the information age, agility and

flexibility are key characteristics for enterprises’

business success. Paradoxically, actual information

and communication technology (ICT) solutions do

not guarantee a true natural operational

environment; they often separate and isolate

particular departments, companies, supply chains,

authorities, research institutions and each individual

of their surroundings. In this context, technologies

such as Peer-to-Peer (P2P), Web services, workflow

system, intelligent agents emerge as core solutions

for enterprise integration (EI). Therefore, it is

required to develop new applications, frameworks,

paradigms, information systems architectures in a

speedy manner which than facilitate the achievement

of flexible business ICT infrastructure support and

can serve as basis for EI.

The current research project addresses the issues

entified by the European Commission as research

challenges for enabling technologies supporting e-

activities (European Commission, 2004), and

contributes to the realization of a full-flagged

collaborative working environment that answers the

needs of the current e-activities, supporting the

development of new technologies and functionalities

in ICT area.

The aim of this paper is to concisely present

me business integration reference models,

frameworks, standards and technologies, and to

propose a new approach towards the elaboration of a

business networking environment based on Plug-

and-Do Business paradigm.

2 ENTERPRISE INTEGRATION

2.1 Needs for Enterprise Integration

The complex and sometimes hostile business

environment, the new forms of collaboration and the

heterogeneity of information systems adopted by

enterprises require innovative solutions able to

handle distributed business processes that cross the

borders of various enterprises in a networked

environment. EI aims at developing solutions and

computer-based tools that facilitate the coordination

of work and information flow across organizational

boundaries. “EI is concerned with facilitating

information, control and material flows across

organizational boundaries by connecting all the

necessary functions and heterogeneous functional

entities (information systems, devices, applications,

and people) in order to improve communication,

cooperation, and coordination within this enterprise

455

Chituc C. and Lopes Azevedo A. (2005).

TOWARDS A SELF-FORMING BUSINESS NETWORKING ENVIRONMENT.

In Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems, pages 455-458

DOI: 10.5220/0002522404550458

 SciTePress

so that the enterprise behaves as an integrated whole,

therefore enhancing its overall productivity,

flexibility, and capacity for management of change

(or reactivity)” (Vernadat, 1996).

EI does not represent a new issue. Evolving from

physical integration to application and later business

integration, EI has been a challenge for both

information technology (IT) and manufacturing

industries for several decades. Despite the existence

of a significant number of computer-based tools

claiming to support EI and scientific results in the

business networking area and on the so-called

“collaborative work”, it is generally accepted that

more work needs to be done since available

solutions are usually cumbersome and lack in

flexibility to respond to the most recent

technological outcomes, focusing on very specific

aspects, and do not provide or tackle all aspects

related to EI. The scientific community agrees that

questions related to the formalization, conceptual

development and semantic integration (namely

concerning the formal description of the domain,

ontology, behavior, etc.) are fundamental research

topics waiting for a consistent development

(Camarinha-Matos, 2003).

2.2 Enterprise Integration Reference

Models, Frameworks, Standards

and Technologies

Several reference models and architectures were

developed aiming at organizing EI knowledge and

serve as guide in EI programs. This section

succinctly presents some integration reference

models, frameworks, standards referring to business-

to-business (B2B) domain, and relevant

infrastructures and technologies supporting EI.

A. Reference Models and Frameworks

SCOR (Supply Chain Operations Reference

Model) (www.supply-chain.org) is a process

reference model developed as cross-industry

standard for supply-chain management, used to

describe, measure and evaluate supply-chain

configurations. SCOR model is organized around

five primary management processes (plan, source,

make, deliver and return) that allow it to be used to

describe, measure and evaluate very simple or very

complex supply chains by using a common set of

definitions.

GERAM (Generalized Enterprise Reference

Architecture and Methodology) (GERAM

IFAC/IFIP, 2000) refers to the methods, models and

tools which are needed to build and maintain the

integrated enterprise, a single enterprise or a

network of enterprises. GERAM is not a reference

architecture; it aims at organizing enterprises’

existing integration knowledge.

Zackman’s Framework for enterprise

architecture (Zachman, 1987) describes a holistic

model of an enterprise information infrastructure

from different perspectives, ensuring that all aspects

of an enterprise are well organized and exhibit clear

relationships.

Workflow Reference Model (Workflow

Management Coalition, 1999) provides the general

architecture framework that defines interfaces and

covers broadly various area of functionality between

a Workflow Management System and its

environment.

B. Business-to-Business Integration Standards

As defined by (Bussler, 2003), B2B integration

is the enabling technology and the necessary

infrastructure (referred as B2B integration

technology) to make automated supply chain

integration possible, to send XML-formatted

messages over the Internet, to send messages in a

P2P pattern to trading partners or to exchange

messages with marketplaces.

According to (SWWS, 2003), B2B standards’

scope can be roughly separated into: catalogue

systems (i.e. BMEcat, eCX-Electronic Catalog

XML, OCP-Open Catalog Protocol) and

classification standards (i.e. Ecl@ss, UNSPSC-

United Nations Standard Products and Services);

document exchange (i.e. EDI-Electronic Data

Interchange, EDIFACT -Electronic Data Interchange

For Administration, Commerce and Transport,

XML- eXtensible Markup Language, xCBL-XML

Common Business Library, cXML-commerce

eXtensible Markup Language, RNIF-RosettaNet

Implementation Framework); collaboration (i.e.

ebXML – Electronic Business XML Initiative,

RosettaNet); and business processes.

C. Infrastructures and Technologies

Message-Oriented Middleware (MOM) is a

client/server infrastructure that increases the

interoperability and flexibility of an application by

allowing it to be distributed over multiple

heterogeneous platforms.

Agent technologies brought a promising

contribution to the development of infrastructures

and services supporting collaborative networked

organizations (Camarinha-Matos, 2004). The

conceptual approach behind solutions designed and

developed for agent-based architectures strongly

relies on the interaction of autonomous processes

that dynamically coordinate their actions by

communicating with each other.

Web services are self-contained, self-describing

modular applications that can be published, located

and invoked across the Web.

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Semantic Web is an extension of the current

Web in which information is given well-defined

meaning, better enabling computers and people to

work in cooperation.

P2P technology allows the development and

secure deployment of business solutions supporting

several communication capabilities, such as

transparency, awareness, adaptability or mobility.

3 TOWARDS A PLUG-AND-DO

BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

3.1 Plug-and-Do-Business Paradigm

Plug-and-Do-Business paradigm refers to the natural

integration of an enterprise in a networked

environment. European Commission’s Information

Society Technologies R&D Program (Backet et. al.,

2002) hosted an expert group with a view to

providing a framework for the development of a

radically new basis for interoperability of Internet-

enabled business (applications). The group is aiming

at building a wide consensus on the strategy and

approaches, which could be implemented through a

research initiative supporting the vision of “Plug and

Do Business”. The technology-oriented themes

identified were: modeling Internet-worked

organizations; open architectures supporting inter-

enterprise collaboration, and ontologies. The current

research project tackles these areas of research.

Few approaches to Plug-and-Do Business

paradigm have been made. IBM developed and

promoted On Demand Business (ODB). ODB

represents “an enterprise whose business processes-

integrated end-to-end across the company and with

key partners, suppliers and customers – can respond

with speed to any customer demand, market

opportunity or external threat” (IBM). It relays on

three levels of integration: horizontal integration,

vertical integration and integration across the value

chain.

The solution of the current under development

research project will assure just-in-time just-in-place

business process execution, trust-based B2B

integration, transparent inter-enterprise business

processes access, seamless contract- and ontology-

based access to a networked organization by

focusing on semantic integration on top of B2B

standards, and distributed workflow technology will

be used for coordination activities.

3.2 Main Research Questions

The research project under development will provide

an improved understanding of critical issues related

to EI and networked organizations, which could

eventually lead to answers to questions such as:

Question 1: Which are the differences and

similarities of the current existing (or still under

development) frameworks for business networking?

Question 2: Are the available technical solutions and

conceptual frameworks competing or are they

complementary?

Question 3: Which criteria must be used to compare

the available integration frameworks and standards?

Question 4: Which is the most effective

methodology allowing the integration, in a natural

way, of one or more networked organizations?

Question 5: Which are the organizational, functional

and technological requirements for the

implementation of an integration paradigm suited for

a Plug-and-Do-Business environment?

Question 6: Which are the requirements for the

semantic integration among heterogeneous and

autonomous business partners that are part of a

network?

By answering all these questions, it will be

possible to respond the main research question: how

is it possible to achieve self-forming collaborative

networks?

3.3 Methodology

The methodology developed has three main phases:

foundations (research basis and business

orientation), development (business model,

infrastructure, and prototypes development) and

evaluation (deployment and evaluation). Thus

during the first phase of the project research results

are intended to give input to the development phase,

development tests can also inform what is feasible in

terms of research and business goals. Similarly, the

third phase of the research project intends to apply

the output to the development process, which will

lead to improved output to test. In this way, the

research and development activities and outcomes

are combined. The first phase (foundations) provides

requirements, models and specifications to the

second phase (development), while the second phase

infers outcomes, which will focus research. Similar

relationships hold between all three phases.

Phase 1 (Foundations) provides the research

basis and business orientation for the research

project. It contains the following sub-phases:

a) Requirements capture and state of the art,

aiming at identifying, representing and structuring

the requirements related to the research project

TOWARDS A SELF-FORMING BUSINESS NETWORKING ENVIRONMENT

457

domain by using requirements engineering

methodologies;

b) Business collaboration logic sub-phase aims

at developing the business logic for self-forming

networking organizations by the inter-operation of

the business processes;

c) Business collaboration infrastructure sub-

phase has as objective the elaboration of a roadmap

for the implementation and usage of different

technologies supporting collaborative environments.

Phase 2 (Development) aims at developing the

business model, supporting infrastructure, and also

the implementation of two prototypes that will

validate the concepts developed. It contains two sub-

phases:

a) Building the collaborative operational

environment sub-phase aims at specifying the

operational environment for the self-forming

business network;

b) Prototype deployment sub-phase has as

objective the design and implementation of two

concept prototypes.

Phase 3 (Evaluation) aims at assessing project’s

results. There will be designed and developed

several scenarios, and pilot instantiations will be

made.

4 CONCLUSIONS AND FURTHER

WORK

The need to support EI is increasing. Several

conceptual frameworks, integration standards and

technologies are being developed. Although there

are available several tools claiming to support EI

and numerous scientific results in the business

networking area and on the so-called “collaborative

work”, it is generally accepted that more work needs

to be done. The urgent need for new business ICT

solutions is also shown in several research projects,

such as VOSTER (http://voster.vtt.fi) or

THINKcreative (http://www.thinkcreative.org).

The current research project proposes a new

approach aiming at building a business collaborative

environment based on Plug-and-Do business

paradigm, allowing the natural integration of an

enterprise in a networked environment, and

exploring issues on semantic integration and

technologies, such as P2P, Web services, Workflow

and agents.

Further work will be developed towards the

development of a self-forming business networking

environment, in order to achieve the objectives

proposed by the research project, while making

methodology and concept tuning.

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