Definition of Target Knowledge in virtual Enterprises

A virtual enterprise is a new organisational paradigm which requires novel technological approaches to managing data, information and knowledge in an efficient way. Knowledge management systems have been adopted as a solution to deal with enterprise systems which generate a huge amount of data, and also need to manage information in an appropriate manner and to share knowledge for decision-making. However, these systems are even more essential in the context of virtual enterprises, where business success is based on interoperability achieved by means of ICT, and therefore there is a need for a common conceptual framework that enables partners in the virtual enterprise to share data, information, and knowledge. Thus, the implementation of this kind of technologies in virtual enterprises demands new, more specific requirements. In this paper, we propose a conceptual framework that introduces the concept of target knowledge as a first step for implementing efficient knowledge management systems, and for further knowledge representation in the context of virtual enterprises. Finally, a classification of target knowledge defined taking into account several enterprise dimensions is provided.