Business Network Modelling: SOA-Based Approach and Dynamic Logistics Case Study

Business networks have appeared as a reaction to changes taking place in the world economy and logistic networks can be considered as examples of such networks. The approach proposed in the paper is based on the idea to represent the business network members with services provided by them, and to achieve interoperability via application of the SOA standards. The approach is based on usage of such technologies as Web services, ontology, and context management. Web services enable interoperability at the technological level. Ontologies are used for description of knowledge domains and enable interoperability at the level of semantics. The purpose of the context is to represent only relevant information from the large amount of the information and the application of the approach is demonstrated on the case study from the area of dynamic logistics. The considered problem takes into account a continuously changing problem environment and requires nearly real-time solving.