B2B Integration : A Practical Guide to Collaborative E-commerce

382 B2B Integration — A Practical Guide to Collaborative E-commerce
13.1. Software Agents Enabling the Formation of
Virtual Organizations
B2Bi requires companies to go through a big structural change, wherein
the hierarchical, coordinated organization model is replaced by the
decentralized business network, leading to virtual organizations.
In order to have operational efficiency and productivity, virtual
organizations should be able to communicate, cooperate and collaborate
with each other in real-time. However, there is a need to ensure that the
rise in productivity is not lowered or even over-compensated for by the
overhead of coordination efforts required among cross-organization
departments.
The Solution:
Software agents are an effective tool for virtual organizations because
they provide mechanisms to automate several activities, such as gathering
and filtering information, negotiating deals and synchronizing business
processes and workflows. Intelligent software agents can work on behalf
of human knowledge workers, be it supplier or buyer or both.
Software agents find applications in a variety of domains, including:
B2B e-commerce, Internet-based information systems, robotics, smart
systems, decision support systems, data mining and knowledge discovery.
This chapter focuses on the role of software agents in B2B e-commerce
and B2B integration.
The opportunities for using intelligent agents in B2B applications
are enormous, mainly because the fundamental need of buyers over
the Internet is to find the best price and that of sellers is to get an
optimum price from buyers and multiply sales. These needs give rise to
a variety of intelligent agents working for B2B buyers and sellers.
Agent technology can also be very useful in searching the Internet or
an Intranet, negotiating deals and automating customer relationship
management, supply chain management and market pricing.
13.2. What are Intelligent Software Agents
An intelligent software agent is essentially a program that autonomously
senses the environment, acts upon it and adapts to the environment with