E3 Value

Modeling strategic partnerships using the e3value ontology
A field study in the banking industry
Carol Kort Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands Email: [e-mail] Jaap Gordijn Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands Email: [e-mail]

1

Introduction

Companies increasingly form networked value constellations to jointly satisfy a complex need. Well known examples include the networked business model of Cisco Systems [Tapscott, D., Ticoll, D., & Lowy, A., 2000] and the virtual integration of Dell Computers [Magretta, J.,1998]. In a value constellation, a series of enterprises and final customers co-produce things of economic value, using network technology such as the Internet to coordinate this process. By doing so, they exploit each other’s core competencies to a maximum extent, and enterprises can concentrate on and develop their own core competencies themselves. Obviously, forming a constellation requires coordination and communication mechanisms to be in place, to facilitate co-working between the various enterprises the constellation exists of. One of the problems in value constellations is that every enterprise speaks another language, thereby creating misunderstandings and barriers for proper communication. Such misunderstanding happens at all levels: information systems of various enterprise that are not very well interconnected, business processes that can not easily interoperate over enterprise borders, and even the constellation itself in terms of the participating enterprises and the services and products these enterprises transfer between each other is not always unambiguously understood. One approach to address the misunderstanding is to use ontologies. According to [Gruber, T.R., 1993] ontology can be defined as: “… an explicit specification of a conceptualization” The term “ontology” is borrowed from philosophy, here an ontology is a systematic account of existence. In the realm of information systems and AI,

References: Andrews,T., Curbera, F., Dholakia, H., Goland, Y., Klein, J., Leymann, F., Liu, K., Roller, D., Smith, D., Thatte, S., Trickovic, I., Weerawarana, S. (2003). Business Process Execution Language for Web Services Version 1.1. Technical report, BEA Systems, IBM, Microsoft, SAP, Siebel. Berger, A.L., Demsetz, R.S., & Strahan, P.E. (1999). The consolidation of the financial services industry: causes, consequences, and implications for the future, Journal of Banking & Finance, 23, 135-194. Borst, W.N., Akkermans, J.M. & Top, J.L. (1997). ‘Engineering ontologies’, International Journal of HumanComputer Studies 46, 365–406. Buhr, R.J.A. (1998). ‘Use case maps as architectural entities for complex systems’, IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering 24(12), 1131–1155. Horngren, C.T. & Foster, G. (1987), Cost Accounting: A Managerial Emphasis, sixth edition, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ. Gordijn, J., Akkermans, J.M. (2003). Value based requirements engineering: Exploring innovative e-commerce idea. In Requirements Engineering Journal, Vol. 8(2):114-134 Gruber, T.R. (1993), Towards principles for the design of ontologies used for knowledge sharing, in Guarino N., & Poli, R., eds, ‘International Workshop on Formal Ontology, Padova, Italy. Magretta, J. (1998), ‘The power of virtual integration: An interview with Dell Computer’s Michael Dell’, Harvard Business Review 76(2), 72–84. McCarthy, W.E. (1982). ‘The REA accounting model: A generalized framework for accounting systems in a shared data environment’, Accounting Review, 57(3), 554–578. Osterwalder, A., Pigneur, Y., & Tucci, C.L., (2005). ‘Clarifying business models: Origins, present, and future of the concept’, Communications of the Association for Information Systems (CAIS) 16(1), 1–25. Available at http://cais.isworld.org/contents.asp/. Porter, M.E. (1985). Competitive advantage: creating and sustaining superior performance, Boston, MT: Harvard Business School Press. Porter, M.E., & Fuller, M.B. (1986). Coalitions and global strategy. In Porter, M.E., Competition in global industries, Boston, MT: Harvard Business School Press. Quine, W.V.O. (1961), From a Logical Point of view, Nine Logico-philosophical Essays, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA. Tan, Y.H., Thoen, W., & Gordijn, J. (2004). Modeling controls for value exchanges in virtual organizations. In LNCS 2995, Trust Management, Proceedings of the 2nd international conference on trust management (pp. 236-250) Oxford, UK: Springer Verlag. Todeva, E., & Knoke, D. (2005). Strategic alliances and models of collaborations, Management Decision, 1(43), 123-148 Tapscott, D., Ticoll, D., & A. Lowy (2000), Digital Capital - Harnessing the Power of Business Webs, Nicholas Brealy Publishing, London, UK. Yoshino, M.Y., & Rangan, U.S. (1995). Strategic Alliances, Boston, MT: Harvard Business School Press.