Concurrent Enterprising: Toward the Concurrent Enterprise in the Era of the Internet and Electronic Commerce presents the concurrent enterprise business model and concurrent enterprising approach, which is emerging as a crucial challenge for organizations in all geographical locations and economic sectors. To achieve this goal, this book deals with the main aspects of the merging context in which enterprises are doing business. This context is characterized by the fastest-spread information and communication technologies (ICT) that constitute the new infrastructure of the global marketplace. This book discusses a set of the most advanced enterprise paradigms created during the 1980s and 1990s, most of them supported by advanced research programs, especially in the worldwide manufacturing industry. The book discusses differences between these enterprise paradigms and presents Internet-related technologies as a main driver toward a new business model. It then examines less theoretical questions - among them, how to implement this new business model and how companies can move to the concurrent enterprise paradigm in creating a concurrent business environment. And it introduces a methodology for enterprises willing to maintain or even improve their competitiveness in the global marketplace. The book has eight chapters. The first two concentrate on the advanced enterprise paradigms, and their advantages and limits for maintaining or improving competitiveness in the global marketplace. Chapter 3 studies, separately, the virtual enterprise and related approaches. Chapter 4 studies another fundamental ingredient of the new business model - concurrent engineering (CE). Chapter 5 summarizes these preceding approaches and establishes a foundation for building a concurrent enterprise. Chapter 6 presents specific business cases illustrating the advantages and limits of virtual enterprise applications and introduces electronic commerce and electronic documents. Chapter 7 presents concurrent enterprise as a new business model, and Chapter 8 synthesizes the concurrent enterprising process. Concurrent Enterprising: Toward the Concurrent Enterprise in the Era of the Internet and Electronic Commerce is a reference and a user’s guide designed for business managers, IT managers, engineers, researchers, scientists, and other individuals interested in learning how to use a sustainable business model driven by the Internet and electronic commerce.
