Tiago Cardoso

A proposal for a reference curriculum for teaching Collaborative Networks at university level is introduced. This curriculum is based on the experience of the authors in teaching and disseminating corresponding concepts in the context of several international projects as well as on the findings of a survey conducted worldwide. A set of teaching units and the corresponding content are introduced. Guidelines for the application of the curriculum are given. A set of experiments and projects are also suggested as a support for the accompanying hands-on lab work. Finally, one concrete experience of application of the proposed curriculum is described.

The practical implantation of the concept of dynamic virtual enterprise is still far from expectations due to a number of factors such as the lack of appropriate interoperable infrastructures and tools, lack of common ontology, and the socio-organizational difficulties. However, the creation of industry clusters supported by advanced information and communication tools can meanwhile provide a basis for the rapid creation of dynamic virtual enterprises in response to the market opportunities. A federated service management approach is introduced in this context and its application to the tourism industry is discussed. Finally, the support for the aggregation of simpler services into value-added services, implemented by distributed business processes within different organizations, is presented.

Partners search and selection is an important activity in the life cycle of a Virtual Enterprise. Among other factors, the commitment of the potential partners to fulfil quality requirements is a major decision criterion during the selection phase. An approach to search suppliers in suppliers’ directories available on Internet is presented and the major negotiation steps leading to an adequate selection of partners are introduced. The quality-related information management functionalities required in a virtual enterprise support platform are also discussed.