Decision Support in Virtual Organizations: The Case for Multi-Agent Support

The new economy, which is being formed by the Internet-based e-commerce and the now emerging mobile commerce, may become what Martin calls a cyber economy. This will combine traditional business with the new e- and mobile business, and will be driven by a new breed of online customers, who operate both wired and wireless networks, who will expect fast delivery, easier transactions and more fact-based information. The cyber economy requires that business is operated with virtual organisations and that decision making in this context – virtual organisations and the cyber economy – will require new and advanced forms of decision support. We have found that a useful decision platform can be built around hyperknowledge and the use of multiple software agents, if the core of these agents is built on fuzzy logic and approximate reasoning.