The Ecolead Plug&Play Collaborative Business Infrastructure

Managing Decisions on Changes in the Virtual Enterprise Evolution

“…Traditionally, SMEs have many difficulties to access, use and maintain software, mainly due to its costs and to the required staff to maintain it. The proposed architecture has been conceived to work under the on-demand approach, where [15] have developed a secure ICT infrastructure devoted to CNs where the access to it is totally made in the form of services, following the SOA (Service Oriented Architecture) paradigm. The current version of this infrastructure only covers the VE creation [27] and operation phases [9].…”

“…Groupware tools [12] have been largely used nowadays to support multiple users working on related tasks in local and remote networks. This can also involve supporting tools for argumentation, like HERMES [13], methods to help finding consensus on topics of discussion, like DELPHI [14], and integrated and secure web-based groupware services devoted to CNs, like the one developed by Woelfel et al (described by Rabelo et al [15]). …”

“…Actually, this is one of the conditions to work as such [15]. In the context of VE evolution and decision-making, a secure ICT infrastructure is responsible for supporting all the mentioned functionalities.…”

Collaboration in Decision Making: A Semi-Automated Support for Managing the Evolution of Virtual Enterprises

“…The toolbox concept was introduced in (Bernhard, 1992) with the goal of providing a pool of industrial software to help users from all departments of a single company to implement the CIM philosophy (Computer Integrated Manufacturing). This concept was largely extended in Rabelo et al (2008) through the development of a web based distributed ICT infrastructure (ICT-I) devoted to CNOs. The access to ICT-I is totally made in the form of services, which are invoked either by the user or by other software services.…”

“…Yet, that the information comes from recognized and authenticated partners and sources. Rabelo et al (2008) developed an integrated, web-based and on-demand ICT infrastructure devoted to cope with CNO requirements. Although it currently does not have implemented all those necessary functionalities to support the VE evolution phase (at least in the way the problem is approached in this work), it is opened to receive new functions.…”