1 / 16

Virtual Enterprise Normative Framework within Electronic Institutions

Virtual Enterprise Normative Framework within Electronic Institutions. Henrique Lopes Cardoso 1,2 , Eugénio Oliveira 1 hlc@ipb.pt , eco@fe.up.pt 1 LIACC, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto 2 Polytechnic Institute of Bragança. Outline. VO/VE and MAS Electronic Institutions

spiro
Download Presentation

Virtual Enterprise Normative Framework within Electronic Institutions

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. Virtual Enterprise Normative Framework within Electronic Institutions Henrique Lopes Cardoso1,2, Eugénio Oliveira1 hlc@ipb.pt, eco@fe.up.pt 1 LIACC, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto 2 Polytechnic Institute of Bragança

  2. Outline • VO/VE and MAS • Electronic Institutions • E-contracting and VE contracts • Normative Framework • VE Contract specification • Current work • Agent society perspective • Open issues ESAW'04

  3. Virtual Organizations/Enterprises • VO/VE concept • Applied to many forms of cooperative business relations, like outsourcing, supply chains, or temporary consortiums • Definition • “a temporary consortium of autonomous, diverse and possibly geographically dispersed organizations that pool their resources to meet short-term objectives and exploit fast-changing market trends” [Davulcu et al., 1999] • Consortium contract [Portuguese legislation] • entities coordinate their efforts towards accomplishing some activity • consortium types: • External: new entity represents joint activity to third parties • Internal: consortium’s goal does not include supply of goods to third parties (although the members’ goals might) ESAW'04

  4. VE Lifecycle Business definition client need; market opportunity Formation goal definition; selection of participants through negotiation; roles and obligations Operation business development Regulation adjustments in consortium structure (exit/entrance of partners) Dissolution goals accomplished; VE no longer justified ESAW'04

  5. MAS and VO/VE • Autonomous agents as enterprises: • represent individual interests of an enterprise • negotiate in order to constitute a VO • cooperate by coordinating their activities, fulfilling the VO purpose • Normative perspective • agents are heterogeneous, independently developed and privately owned • Need for normative systems that enable trust • agents follow norms or suffer consequences • agents commit to cooperative agreements (business norms regulating the consortium activity) ESAW'04

  6. Electronic Institutions • EI as an agent interaction framework • regulations • trustable environment • EI regulations • Identity of members • registration, digital signatures • Shared ontology specifications • domain-independent business terms and domain-specific vocabulary • Business norms • applicable to any business engagement • Negotiation protocols • for negotiating contract clauses, possibly requiring mediation • Contract specification • formal contractual requirements (representation, signatures, …) ESAW'04

  7. Electronic Institution Members Negotiation Protocols Contract templates Ontologies Transaction repository Members’ reputation Business norms Contract registry Registration Brokering Negotiation mediation Contract validation / registration (notary) Contract monitoring and enforcement Reputation Electronic Institutions’ Services ESAW'04

  8. E-contracting • Definition • a contract is a formalization of the behaviour of a group of agents that jointly agree on a specific business activity • E-contracts and norms • contracts form a normative structure • by contracting, agents commit to norms • E-contract handling and institutional services • Information discovery (pre-contractual phase) • brokering (yellow pages) • Contract negotiation (contractual phase) • templates; negotiation mediation; contract validation and registry (notary) • Execution (post-contractual phase) • contract monitoring and enforcement; transaction repository; reputation services ESAW'04

  9. E-contract specification • Usual approach • Normative concepts (from deontic logic): obligation, permission, prohibition • + sanction: making obligations (or prohibitions) effective • Normative statement [Sallé, 2002] • ns: s,b ( < ) • appropriate for simple contracts (e.g. purchase): • ns1: Ose,bu (deliver(product, quantity) < date(delivery_date)) • ns2: fulfilled(ns1)  Obu,se (pay(price) < date(delivery_date+30)) • ns3: not_fulfilled(ns1)  Ose,bu (give_discount(-10%, price)) • ns4: not_fulfilled(ns2)  Obu,se (pay(+5%, price) < date(delivery_date+60)) • What about complex (VE) contracts? ESAW'04

  10. VE Contracts • VE business relationship is more complex in nature than a simple sell/purchase operation • ongoing (although limited) relationship between partners • cyclical interactions • deliberate contract termination • exit/entrance of partners during the VE lifecycle • establishment of contracts with third-parties • profit exchange • A two-level conception of VE contracts • VE constitution vs. operation • Constitutional contract establishes a cooperation agreement • Operational contracts implement the intended cooperation ESAW'04

  11. Normative Framework Institutional norms (the law) Virtual Enterprise constitution (cooperation agreement) Contract validation framework against which a VE contract can be validated Contract monitoring / enforcement Operational contract (executable norms) platform of cooperation within which operational contracts between VE participants can be checked actual exchanges of products/services, which can be monitored ESAW'04

  12. VE Contract specification • Focusing on the cooperation commitment: VEContract = <H, CoopEff, BP> • Header (H): contract id, normative system, organization participants, resources to be exchanged, signing date, digital signatures H = <Id, NormSys, Partics, Ress, Date, Signs> Partics = {Partici} Ress = {Resk} Signs = {Signi} • Cooperation effort (CoopEff): workload acceptance levels and associated prices CoopEff = {<Partici, Resk, Wload>} Wload = <MinQt, MaxQt, Freq, UnitPr> Freq  {per_day, per_week, per_month, per_year} ESAW'04

  13. VE Contract specification (2) • Business process (BP): flow of resources between participants BP = <{ReqPermm}, {OblChainn}> • Request permits (ReqPerm): allowed requests that parties may perform towards their partners ReqPerm = <Who, Whom, What> Who, Whom  Partics; What  Ress; <Whom, What, _>  CoopEff • Obligation chains (OblChain): implement the business transaction steps composing the required workflow • activated by the enactment of request permits • can be regarded as templates for operational contracts (executable norms) OblChain = <OblRule1, OblRule2, …, OblRulep> OblRule = <ActCond, Obl> ESAW'04

  14. Current work • Declarative representation for • institutional norms • VE constitutional and operational contracts • enabling • validation of contracts according to the normative framework • monitoring and enforcement of operational contracts • regulation of the VE lifecycle • Integrate institutional services • focus on contract handling • contract creation • templates • negotiation mediation • contract validation • contract monitoring/enforcement • transaction registration • sanction imposition • reputation mechanisms ESAW'04

  15. Agent society perspective • Normative framework for self-interested agents in cooperative scenarios • Agent interaction regulated by institutions • EI provides a trustable environment by imposing and enforcing norms • Agent cooperation agreements impose further norms • agents voluntarily commit to norms because organized cooperation is in their interest • Agent operational contracts enact cooperation • by fulfilling executable norms agents carry out their cooperation agreements ESAW'04

  16. Open issues • Relational contracting • formal contract: fully specified enforceable contract based on a third party (EI) • relational contract: self-enforceable, based on the value of future relationships • (How) can agents learn the level of detail for their contracts according to past experience and agents’ reputations? • (How) can the EI impose certain specifications to non-fulfilling agents? • Norm evolution • Can new institutional norms emerge from the continuous operation of the EI? ESAW'04

More Related