A prototype multi-agent ERP system: an integrated architecture and a conceptual framework

This paper proposes a prototype multi-agent enterprise resource planning (MAERP) system that utilizes the characteristics and capabilities of software agents to achieve enterprise wide integration. A software agent is a self-contained, autonomous software module that performs assigned tasks from the human user and interacts/communicates with other applications and other software agents in different platforms to complete the tasks. Four types of intelligent software agents (coordinating agents, task agents, data collecting agents, and user interface agents) are examined and discussed in the proposed MAERPS architecture. We demonstrate how the proposed prototype MAERP system takes advantage of existing information systems among various functional areas to achieve the system integration of commercially available enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, while avoiding numerous problems encountered during a typical ERP implementation. (C) 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.