EMP -: A database-driven electronic market place for business-to-business commerce on the Internet

Electronic commerce systems for business-to-business commerce on the Internet are still in their infancy. The realization of Internet electronic markets for business-to-business following a n-suppliers : m-customers scenario is still unattainable with todays solutions. Comprehensive Internet electronic commerce systems should provide for easy access to and handling of the system, help to overcome differences in time of business, location, language between suppliers and customers, and at the same time should support the entire process of trading for business-to-business commerce. In this paper, we present a DBMS-based electronic commerce architecture and its prototypical implementation for business-to-business commerce according to a n-suppliers : m-customers scenario. Business transactions within the electronic market are realized by a set of modular market services. Multiple physically distributed markets can be interconnected transparently to the users and form one virtually central market place. The modeling and management of all market data in a DBMS gives the system a solid basis for reliable, consistent, and secure trading on the market. The generic and modular system architecture can be applied to arbitrary application domains. The system is scalable and can cope with an increasing number of single markets, participants, and market data due to the possibility to replicate and distribute services and data and herewith to distribute data, system, and network load.