A Process-Driven Approach to Develop Multi-agent System for Cooperation in Concurrent New Product Development

Abstract

Recently, several multi-agent system (MAS) development approaches have been proposed and constituted on a goal basis to support the cooperation in a concurrent new product development (CNPD) environment. However, in a CNPD process, different cooperation requirements take place at different stages and need different workgroups to be involved. The goal-driven MAS development approaches only provide a partial solution. This research has proposed a two-phased process-driven approach to develop the MAS framework for fulfilling the overall CNPD cooperation requirement. In the process-driven cooperation requirements analysis phase, the desired CNPD process and cooperation workflow are defined. Next, the MAS specification design phase derives the MAS specification, including the agent classes, their conversations and system configuration, from the CNPD process and cooperation workflow. Finally, an empirical case is developed to verify the feasibility of the proposed approach.