Partner detection and selection in emergent holonic enterprises

Abstract

Web-centric virtual enterprises, to be successful, need to be highly innovative and competitive. Both features can only be achieved if the underlying structure is ever emerging and dynamic. Unsatisfactory member organizations need to be replaced by better ones and/or the conglomerate is to be extended if organizations are detected that can contribute substantially to the success of the virtual enterprise. This paper presents the key concepts of an emergence model and discusses how the best possible partners for a given (bunch of) task(s) can be found and evaluated to guarantee that always the best choice is made. Moreover, the overall objectives of a virtual enterprise and the individual objectives of involved agents need to be harmoniously integrated in order to guarantee the overall success of the conglomerate as well as the success of the individual agents. To achieve this intentional problem solving is introduced. It allows agents to cluster and collaborate in a way that fits best to the individual goals of each agent (e.g. maximum profit) as well as considering the overall objectives of the next higher level (e.g., virtual enterprise) as far-reaching as possible.