Evaluation of state of the art technologies, GLOBEMEN Deliverable D411

The report gives an overview of the current practice of inter-enterprise business processes and information and communication technology (ICT) support at a functional and technical level. ICT is seen as the enabler for current and future virtual enterprise concepts and functionality. It includes topics such as tools, methods, and models, and can range from as wide as reference architectures to middleware technology.

This document is organised as follows. The next chapter contains some requirements as defined by the industrial partners in Globemen. Chapter 3 contains virtual enterprise concepts and constructs for background information. The frame for the remainder of the document is set in chapter 4, where ALIVE (Architecture for Layered Integration of Virtual Enterprises) is introduced.

Each of the components in ALIVE is subsequently discussed in detail in the chapters 6 to 10. Chapter 5 discusses reference architectures and methodologies, which should guide a user to fill in the various types of integration as indicated by ALIVE. The first type of integration, inter-enterprise coordination, is not described in this deliverable, but in the various WP1-3 deliverables.

The topic of modelling languages for business process integration is treated in chapter 6. Application integration is discussed in chapters 7 and 8, where semantical respectively syntactical standards are central. Standards for physical integration are briefly touched upon in chapter 9. In addition to the technical aspects, there is a range of non-technical prerequisites for integration in virtual enterprises.

Chapter 10 considers these prerequisites. Finally, a discussion on the highlights of innovation in Globemen ends this document.