Frontiers in Enterprise Integration

Book excerpt: Enterprise Information Systems (EIS) integrate and support business processes across functional boundaries in a supply chain environment, and have become increasingly popular over the last 15 years. In recent years, more and more enterprises world-wide have adopted EIS such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) for running their businesses. Previously, information systems such as CAD, CAM, MRPII and CRM were widely used for partial functional integration within a business organization. With global operation, global supply chain, and fierce competition in place, there is a need for suitable EIS such as ERP, E-Business or E-Commerce systems to integrate extended enterprises in a supply chain environment with the objective of achieving efficiency, competency, and competitiveness. As a result, there is a growing demand for researching EIS to provide insights into challenges, issues, and solutions related to the design, implementation and management of EIS. The papers in Advances in Enterprise Information Systems were selected from two premier international conferences: the International Forum of Information Systems Frontiers—Xian International Symposium (IFISF), June 29-30, 2006, Xian, China and the IFIP TC 8.9 International Conference on Research and Practical Issues of Enterprise Information Systems (Confenis 2007), October 14-16, Beijing, China. Both events provided an excellent opportunity for EIS academicians and practitioners in the world to gather and exchange ideas, and present original research in their fields. Advances in Enterprise Information Systems will be invaluable to scientists, researchers and professionals in EIS.