An activity theory based approach for ontological modelling of collaborative logistics process dynamics

ABSTRACTThe aspect of collaboration is gaining a considerable amount of importance in current logistics operations. The large number of dynamics that arise in collaborative logistics processes with numerous complexities and variations can make the modelling of such collaborative logistics processes a challenging task. Hence, a systematic modelling approach is required to make sense of the enormous amount of unorganised process information. In this paper, we present an ontological method for modelling the dynamics within collaborative logistics processes. An activity theory-guided approach is employed to elicit the process information, which is then formalised using an ontological model. Dynamic adaptations for the collaborative logistics process operations are supported through an instance level inference of the model. The applicability of the method is demonstrated by means of a case study.doi: 10.1080/13675567.2018.1535650 ABSTRACTThe aspect of collaboration is gaining a considerable amount of importance in current logistics operations. The large number of dynamics that arise in collaborative logistics processes with numerous complexities and variations can make the modelling of such collaborative logistics processes a challenging task. Hence, a systematic modelling approach is required to make sense of the enormous amount of unorganised process information. In this paper, we present an ontological method for modelling the dynamics within collaborative logistics processes. An activity theory-guided approach is employed to elicit the process information, which is then formalised using an ontological model. Dynamic adaptations for the collaborative logistics process operations are supported through an instance level inference of the model. The applicability of the method is demonstrated by means of a case study.status: Published onlin