Business Contract Obligation Monitoring through Use of Multi Tier Contract Ontology

A core business enterprise function is trading with other business organizations. Such trade relationships are governed by legal contracts. The obligations and fulfillment conditions as stipulated in a business contract demand performance of business activities in the pre-defined choreography. Non-performance could lead to serious legal and/or financial implications. Therefore, it is essential to have integrated business and contract workflow management. Domain knowledge of legal business contracts can be represented using the proposed multi-tier contract ontology. This paper analyzes and models the different obligation types found in a contract and also identifies obligation states through which each obligation passes through. Thereafter, the paper proposes a methodology to monitor contractual obligation through the use of Multi tier Contract Ontology and related contract fulfillment process modeled as Contract Workflow Model.