Federation KIT

Purpose

The Discovery mechanism supports an open and loose model without a centralized register that could be searched for all existing BDI Associations. In theory a large number of independent BDI Associations could co-exist without further governance.

Identification, discovery, authentication, trust assesment and authorization in such a perimeter-less network on a global scale requires functions to deal with previously unknown parties.

The reality of business networks is that there is an inherent tension between interoperability on one hand and competition/innovation on the other hand. Standardization lowers costs, but differentiation creates value and competitive advantages: a dynamic trade-off, shifting over time.

Federation has to acknowledge this tradeoff. In practive it is expected that BDI Associations will form federations and voluntarily agree upon common standards, roles and semantics over a group of Associations.

It is expected that a number of frameworks for controlled data sharing wil co-exist. A minimal level of interoperability that reduces uncessary costs is desirable.