The Use of Customer Relationship Management Software in Meta-enterprises for Virtual Enterprise Integration

Abstract

To make the Virtual Enterprise (VE) a real, competitive, and widely implemented organizational and management concept, it is fundamental to assure that the requirements of this organizational model are achieved in the several phases of the Virtual Enterprise life-cycle. The support to VE (comprising design, creation, operation and reconfiguration) must be assured by meta-enterprises based on a broker and computer-aided tools, capable of managing, controlling and enabling virtual enterprise creation/ operation /reconfiguration, which may represent a strong contribution towards the VE performance. The chapter introduces the VE model requirements, focuses one specific meta-enterprise environment called the Market of Resources, and introduces the incorporation of CRM in this environment as one of the computer-aided systems.