ABSTRACT
Every enterprise has unique characteristics that are embedded in its business processes. Most enterprises perform a similar set of repeatable routine activities that may include the development of manufacturing products and services, bringing these products and services to market and satisfying the customers who purchase them. Automated business processes can perform such activities. We may view an automated business process as a precisely choreographed sequence of activities systematically directed toward performing a certain business task and bringing it to completion. Examples of typical processes in manufacturing firms include among other things new product development (which cuts across research and development, marketing, and manufacturing), customer order fulfillment (which combines sales, manufacturing, warehousing, transportation, and billing), and financial asset management. The possibility to design, structure, measure processes, and determine their contribution to customer value makes them an important starting point for business improvement and innovation initiatives.
