Title: Design and development of an agent-based information system for process improvement

Authors: George T.S. Ho, Henry C.W. Lau, C.K.M. Lee, Andrew W.H. Ip, William Ho

Addresses: Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hunghom, Hong Kong. ' Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hunghom, Hong Kong. ' Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hunghom, Hong Kong. ' Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hunghom, Hong Kong. ' Operations and Information Management Group, Aston Business School, Aston University, Birmingham B4 7ET, UK

Abstract: To meet changing needs of customers and to survive in the increasingly globalised and competitive environment, it is necessary for companies to equip themselves with intelligent tools, thereby enabling managerial levels to use the tactical decision in a better way. However, the implementation of an intelligent system is always a challenge in Small- and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). Therefore, a new and simple approach with |process rethinking| ability is proposed to generate ongoing process improvements over time. In this paper, a roadmap of the development of an agent-based information system is described. A case example has also been provided to show how the system can assist non-specialists, for example, managers and engineers to make right decisions for a continual process improvement.

Keywords: agent-based systems; intelligent information systems; multi-agent systems; process improvement; online analytical processing; OLAP; small and medium-sized enterprises; SMEs; virtual agents.

DOI: 10.1504/IJITM.2006.010114

International Journal of Information Technology and Management, 2006 Vol.5 No.2/3, pp.134 - 150

Published online: 20 Jun 2006 *

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