In the supply chains operations planning context, and from a research viewpoint, it has been mainly assumed that different supply chain members make decisions in a centralised manner (one decision centre). However, reality shows that this is not the most usual situation, rather distributed supply chain decision making is. This paper proposes a framework to support modelling the decisional view of collaborative planning from a decision-making process perspective for both centralised and distributed situations. Along these lines, the framework assumes that the supply chain may be composed of one or several decision centres which aim to support every supply chain planning operation. Therefore, the main framework contributions are: consideration of decisions jointly with physical, organisation and information views; the spatial and temporal integration among the different supply chain decision centres; the definition of the macro level for “conceptually” modelling the collaborative planning process and the micro level for developing analytical models in all the decisional activities identified in the supply chains operations planning process. Finally, a brief overview of a real case application is also described.

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Abstract:Methodologies are one of the main elements in EI Projects. In this paper we present an aggregated and comparative analysis of the methodological aspects of several of the main EI proposals from the state-of-the-art of existing EI Methodologies (CIMOSA, PERA, IE-GIP among others). A definition of the set of characteristics that must be provided by an EI methodology is presented as well. UNDERSTANDING ENTERPRISE INTEGRATION METHODOLOGIESA generic methodology can be defined as "the system of methods and principles used in a particular discipline". This definition outlines two main issues. First of all, a methodology is necessarily linked to a particular discipline where it is useful; outside of this discipline, it may not be applicable. Within this work, we focus on IE as the particular discipline of interest. Secondly, the two basic elements of a methodology are methods and principles. Furthermore, Vernadat, ( 1996) defines a methodology as a "group of methods, models and tools". This definition is made from an EI perspective and identifies more specifically the three different elements that must be provided by an EI methodology: (1) methods, (2) models and (3) tools.The authors define an EI methodology as a group of methods targeted to support a business architect in the development of EI projects, supported both by models (the so-called architectures) and tools. Methodologies, architectures and tools are indeed the three main engineering ingredients of EI

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