adfa, p. 1, 2011. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2011 Model Based Enterprise Simulation and Analysis A pragmatic approach reducing the burden on experts Vinay Kulkarni, Tony Clark, Souvik Barat and Balbir Barn {vinay.vkulkarni, souvik.barat}@tcs.com, {t.n.clark, b.barn}@mdx.ac.uk Abstract. Modern enterprises are complex systems operating in highly dynamic environment. The time to respond to the various change drivers is short and the cost of incorrect decisions is prohibitively high. Modern enterprises tend to ex- ist in silos leading to fragmented knowledge with little support available for composing the fragments. Current practice places a heavy burden on experts by requiring a quick and comprehensive solution. This paper proposes a model based approach to this problem in terms of a language to be used for enterprise simulation and analysis that is capable of integrating the ‘what’, ‘how’ and ‘why’ aspects of an enterprise. Possible implementation is also hinted. 1 Introduction Modern enterprises operate in a highly dynamic environment wherein changes due to a variety of external change drivers require a rapid response within a highly con- strained setting. The cost of an erroneous response is prohibitively high and may pos- sibly reduce options for subsequent changes in direction. Two further issues com- pound the problem. Firstly, the large size of modern enterprises means the under- standing of ‘what’ is the enterprise, ‘how’ it operates and ‘why’ it so exists is availa- ble for highly localized parts only. Secondly, existing tool support addresses only one aspect, for instance, i* (http://www.cs.toronto.edu/km/istar/) addresses the ‘why’ aspect, BPMN tools (http://www.softwareag.com/corporate/products/aris/default.asp) address the ‘how’ aspect, ArchiMate (http://www.visual-paradigm.com/) addresses the ‘what’ aspect etc. Moreover, these tools are not only non-interoperable but also paradigmatically different. As a result, today, experts are forced to follow a process wherein: the problem un- der consideration is first decomposed into its ‘why’, ‘what’ and ‘how’ parts; these sub-problems are solved individually and independently making use of the available tool support to the extent possible; and the part-solutions are composed into a whole. This intellectually demanding endeavour becomes even more challenging due to the fractured knowledge and non-interoperable nature of current EA tools. The former constitutes the intrinsic complexity whereas the latter can be viewed as accidental complexity. This position paper explores whether model based engineering (MBE) can take some burden off experts’ shoulders by reducing the intrinsic complexity. MBE has