The Flexible ICT Architecture for Virtual Enterprises

Virtual Enterprises, in our view, are conglomerates of regular enterprises that collaborate on an ad hoc basis to carry out an inter-organisational business process. The Virtual Enterprise has a dynamic structure that depends on the particular process that needs to be carried out. Enterprises can join or leave the Virtual Enterprise (VE) at short notice, depending on capacity and opportunity. In recent papers we studied the use of a mobile agent framework to support the coordination of the primary process in a Virtual Enterprise. We argued that the installation of standard software modules, called service bridges or docks, at the participant enterprises provides a suitable infrastructure for the use of mobile agents for this purpose. The deployment of mobile software agents using such modules has been studied in applications such as networked electronic trading and mediation of negotiations. The emphasis in these applications lies on demonstrating the potential of mobile agents for the support of complex decision problems. In this paper we study the flexibility requirements an agile enterprise such as the VE imposes on its ICT support. We argue that a mobile agentbased ICT architecture will provide the required ICT support. We will discuss a number of change cases and examine their impact on the requirements on the agent - agent and on the agent - system interaction arising from the need for flexibility. Keywords Virtual Enterprise, Architecture, Flexibility, Mobile Agents