A survey of approaches to Virtual Enterprise Architecture: modeling languages, reference models, and architecture frameworks

As the theory and practice of enterprise architecture became mature, researchers and practitioners have started applying similar concepts and approaches to virtual enterprises. The virtual enterprise is a temporary coalition of enterprises joining hands to exploit a particular opportunity. Virtual Enterprise Architecture addresses a Virtual Enterprise holistically at a strategic level. This article provides a definition of Enterprise Architecture, Virtual Enterprise, and Virtual Enterprise Architecture and presents results from a study of six approaches to virtual enterprise architecture for virtual enterprises (NEML, CAML, AVERM, VERAM, BM VEARM, and ARCON)

Eco‐Holonic 4.0 Circular Business Model to Conceptualize Sustainable Value Chain Towards Digital Transition

The purpose of this paper is to conceptualize a circular business model based on an Eco-Holonic Architecture, through the integration of circular economy and holonic principles. A conceptual model is developed to manage the complexity of integrating circular economy principles, digital transformation, and tools and frameworks for sustainability into business models. The proposed architecture is multilevel and multiscale in order to achieve the instantiation of the sustainable value chain in any territory. The architecture promotes the incorporation of circular economy and holonic principles into new circular business models. This integrated perspective of business model can support the design and upgrade of the manufacturing companies in their respective industrial sectors. The conceptual model proposed is based on activity theory that considers the interactions between technical and social systems and allows the mitigation of the metabolic rift that exists between natural and social metabolism. This study contributes to the existing literature on circular economy, circular business models and activity theory by considering holonic paradigm concerns, which have not been explored yet. This research also offers a unique holonic architecture of circular business model by considering different levels, relationships, dynamism and contextualization (territory) aspects

SMEs; Virtual research and development (R&D) teams and new product development: A literature review

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are indeed the engines of global economic growth. Their continued growth is a major subject for the economy and employment of any country. Towards that end, virtual research and development (R&D) could be a viable option to sustain and ease the operations of SMEs. However, literature shows there has not been a great deal of research into the diverse characteristic of virtual R&D teams in SMEs. This article provides a comprehensive literature review on different aspects of virtual R&D teams collected from the reputed publications. The purpose of the literature review is to provide an outline on the structure and dynamics of R&D collaboration in SMEs. Specifying the rationale and relevance of virtual teams, the relationship between virtual R&D team for SMEs and new product development (NPD) has been examined. It concludes with identifying the gaps and feebleness in the existing literature and calls for future research in this area. It is argued to form of virtual R&D team deserves consideration at top level management for venturing into the new product development within SMEs

Virtual R&D teams in small and medium enterprises: a literature review

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are the driving engine behind economic growth. While SMEs play a critical role in generating employment and supporting trade, they face numerous challenges, the prominent among them are the need to respond to fasting time-to-market, low-cost and rapid solutions to complex organizational problems. Towards that end, research and development (R & D) aspect deserves particular attention to promote and facilitate the operations of SMEs. Virtual R & D team could be a viable option. However, literature shows that virtual R & D teaming in SMEs is still at its infancy. This article provides a comprehensive literature review on different aspects of virtual R & D teams collected from the reputed publications. The purpose of the state-of-the-art literature review is to provide an overview on the structure and dynamics of R & D collaboration in SMEs. Specifying the foundation and importance of virtual teams, the relationship between virtual R & D team and SMEs has been examined. It concludes with the identification of the gaps in the existing literature's and calls for future research. It is argued that setting-up an infrastructure for virtual R & D team in SMEs still requires a large amount of engineering efforts and deserves consideration at top level management

Virtual R & D teams in small and medium enterprises: A literature review

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are the driving engine behind economic growth. While SMEs play a critical role in generating employment and supporting trade, they face numerous challenges, the prominent among them are the need to respond to fasting time-to-market, low-cost and rapid solutions to complex organizational problems. Towards that end, research and development (R & D) aspect deserves particular attention to promote and facilitate the operations of SMEs. Virtual R & D team could be a viable option. However, literature shows that virtual R & D teaming in SMEs is still at its infancy. This article provides a comprehensive literature review on different aspects of virtual R & D teams collected from the reputed publications. The purpose of the state-of-the-art literature review is to provide an overview on the structure and dynamics of R & D collaboration in SMEs. Specifying the foundation and importance of virtual teams, the relationship between virtual R & D team and SMEs has been examined. It concludes with the identification of the gaps in the existing literature's and calls for future research. It is argued that setting-up an infrastructure for virtual R & D team in SMEs still requires a large amount of engineering efforts and deserves consideration at top level management.Virtual teams, small and medium enterprises, literature review

SMEs; Virtual research and development (R&D) teams and new product development: A literature review

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are indeed the engines of global economic growth. Their continued growth is a major subject for the economy and employment of any country. Towards that end, virtual research and development (R&D) could be a viable option to sustain and ease the operations of SMEs. However, literature shows there has not been a great deal of research into the diverse characteristic of virtual R&D teams in SMEs. This article provides a comprehensive literature review on different aspects of virtual R&D teams collected from the reputed publications. The purpose of the literature review is to provide an outline on the structure and dynamics of R&D collaboration in SMEs. Specifying the rationale and relevance of virtual teams, the relationship between virtual R&D team for SMEs and new product development (NPD) has been examined. It concludes with identifying the gaps and feebleness in the existing literature and calls for future research in this area. It is argued to form of virtual R&D team deserves consideration at top level management for venturing into the new product development within SMEs.Virtual teams, small and medium enterprises, new product development, R&D

Virtual R&D teams and SMEs growth: A comparative study between Iranian and Malaysian SMEs

This paper explores potential advantages of using virtual teams for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with a comprehensive review on various aspects of virtual teams. Based on the standing of the pertinent literature, attempt has been made to study the aspects by online survey method in Iran and Malaysia. In both countries, SMEs play an important role in their economies, employments, and capacity building. Virtual R&D team can be one of the means to increase SMEs efficiency and competitiveness in their local as well as global markets. In this context, surveys have been conducted to evaluate the effects of virtuality to the growth of SMEs. The study addresses some differences between two countries in engaging virtual research and development (R&D) teams in their SMEs. It is observed that there is a significant difference between the SMEs turnover that employed virtual team and that did not employ the virtual team. The way for further studies and recommend improvements are proposed.Virtual R&D team, small and medium enterprises, survey, developing countries.

Contextual factors and contingent reward leadership: employer adoption of telecommuting

Using a contingency perspective, this paper examines the conditions under which telecommuting is most likely to be adopted with data obtained from a sample of 122 CEOs. We hypothesized that telecommuting fits better in younger organizations, firms with a higher proportion of women and international employees in workforce, and companies that offer variable pay. We found evidence that confirm the prediction that telecommuting, a high proportion of international employees, and the use of variable compensation as an internal control mechanism tend to go hand in hand.

Toward a Multi-disciplinary Business Architecture Reference Model for SMEs

Competing in a global, open and dynamic ecosystem of firms, SMEs require a strategic management tool to manage co-evolution with dynamic environments. To sustain their competitive advantages, SMEs must enhance the capacity of orchestrating and integrating resources/capabilities to adopt/shape their chosen ecosystem and meet the emergent market needs. Drawing from existing literature and preliminary interviews it has been found that SMEs need a simple but holistically comprehensive strategic management tool to help the executives implement entrepreneurial practices that have the capacity to quickly identify new resource configuration to align with the changing environments. In particular we develop a multi-disciplinary Business Architecture Reference Model (BARM) for SMEs to help SMEs create value in an open and dynamic ecosystem. Derived from SMEs’ internal and external strategic requirements, we revisit conceptual model for the SME BARM by integrating diverse but interrelated disciplines including; IS, strategic management, organization, architecture and service sciences. Theoretically grounded from these diverse disciplines, the BARM provides SMEs with a new holistic approach to orchestrate their socio-technical resources/capabilities and manage their co-evolution within the dynamic ecosystem. The proposed BARM for SMEs comprises architectural components and metamodel that helps SMEs plan, articulate and execute their business strategies, resulting in a business-aligned configuration of resources to attain evolutionary fitness with the competitive environments. By incorporating organisation and strategic management theories in the BARM conceptual model, the paper also contributes to the theoretical foundation of architecture sci-ence – accentuating the socio-technical (capability-based) nature of architecture. The preliminary BARM’s efficacy and usability has been validated through interviews with industry experts and SME executives

Customer Relations Management in Information Systems Research

Customer Relations Management (CRM) involves attracting and keeping “Economically Valuable” customers while repelling and eliminating “Economically Invaluable” ones. CRM involves changing relationships and improving return-on-investment from customer relationships (ROI-CR.) We are experiencing a shift from a transaction-based economy to a relationship-based one (Keen 1999.) Two important business relationship types exist: those between enterprises and customers; and those between and among enterprises (Kalakota 1996.) This paper addresses the former. However, a there is a significant amount of research into traditional “Market Channels” (See (Bowersox 1990; Ganesan 1994; Syed Saad 1996; Cannon 1999; Geyskens 1999) for examples) as well as into eCommerce (EC) Market Channels (See (Kim 1999; Menon 1999; Son 1999)) Recent and upcoming scholarship and professional activities illustrate the importance the IS Research Community places on CRM. This paper presents a framework for IS CRM Research Topics, a discussion of IS CRM scholarly and professional research directions and activities