Integrating Process Management Technology with Sensor Data

Dear Colleagues,

Process management technology has contributed to the advancement of process-aware enterprise information systems (PAIS) for more than a decade. Modern companies have adopted research results from the business process management (BPM) field to keep pace with the challenges emerging due to increasing customer demands. Meanwhile, Millennials have fanned the use of mobile technology in everyday life, as well as for many businesses. Consequently, enterprises need to enhance their process-aware information systems to properly integrate smart mobile devices in a flexible and cost-effective way. Along this trend, the sensor capabilities of mobile devices have increased by magnitude of orders enabling an advanced support of business processes and their activities. In the era of the Internet of Things, in addition, numerous sensors emerged that are used ubiquitously in everyday business on a cheap and effective basis. Especially in the light of Industry 4.0 and cyber-physical systems, manufacturers crave for the integration of sensor technology and sensor data with their process-aware information systems. As the latter provide a well-defined context, the context-aware integration of sensors and sensor data becomes powerfully possible.

The aim of this Special Issue is to investigate upcoming challenges, research opportunities, and technologies emerging along the described trends. In particular, the Special Issue shall investigate:

• The impact of considering sensor data on the various stages of the business process lifecycle, i.e., modeling, implementation and configuration, deployment, enactment, monitoring, dynamic adaptation, mining and evolution of business processes.
• The impact of considering business processes on the way sensors systems and networks are built or reorganized.

This Special Issue aims to provide a comprehensive overview of state-of-the-art sensor technology in the light of business process management. We invite research articles that will consolidate the understanding of the state-of-the-art in this area. The Special Issue will publish full research, review, and highly rated manuscripts on the integration of process technology with sensor data, addressing—amongst others—one of the following topics:

• Sensor-enriched process tasks
• Sensor data processing and event management
• System architectures
• Wearables and mobile sensors
• Sensor categories and their relevance for business process support
• Resource tracking and management (e.g., humans vs. robots)
• Sensor- and context-driven processes
• Virtual and augmented reality support for business processes / tasks
• Aligning digital processes with processes from the physical world
• Predictive processes based on sensor data
• Sensor-based detection of discrepancies between digital and real process
• Business process support in the era of the Internet/Web of Things
• Industry 4.0 and Industrial Internet of Things
• Sensor-based exception discovery and handling
• Equipping process resources (incl. humans) with sensors
• Combining process mining with sensor data support

Dr. Rüdiger Pryss
Prof. Massimo Mecella
Prof. Samir Tata
Prof. Manfred Reichert
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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