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The paper refers to the development of online "networks of best practices" as mechanisms for the sharing of practical knowledge and the support of collaboration among business enterprises. The traditional approach in the transfer of best practices considers best practices as any other piece of information that can be stored and processed in electronic repositories/ databases. However, practical knowledge cannot be as easily managed and transferred as information, because it needs social context and interaction. Based on the premise that best practices are practical knowledge ("know-how") that describes how to better implement some business processes and ideas, we elaborate on the literature of communities and networks of practice, in order to find out ways that facilitate the sharing of practical knowledge among business enterprises. By analyzing the purpose and the features of these structures of practice sharing, we argue that best practice forums can be developed as online networks of practice, which we call "networks of best practices". We propose initial design principles for this endeavor and analyze the expected benefits.

Information technology and the Internet favour the development of business networks, in which business partners cooperate to produce composite products and services that meet the customer needs. Customer participation in these networks, even though necessary, is usually neglected or submissive to the needs of the business enterprises. Based on the metaphor of 'business ecosystems', this paper argues for the need to introduce customers as active members of business networks and proposes a conceptual and a business model of customer-centric business ecosystems. The business model is based on a technological platform, which enables the development, the dynamic configuration and the coordination of the customer-centric business ecosystem. The operations of the platform follow the paradigm of service oriented architectures and they can be implemented with the use of web services. The paper discusses also the strategic aspects of the development of customer-centric business ecosystems.

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