The MEC system monitors appropriate databases, typically using events or triggers for changes in the real world, such as a change in inventory status as a result of a transaction that occurred outside the MEC system, or a shipment delay being reflected in the shipper's database. As a result of this continuous monitoring of change, each processing cycle within the MEC system will work from the most current information. The MEC system is highly distributed. Each cluster contains a set of basic component software and a specialized set for the tasks that the cluster performs. The society of clusters supports organizations consisting of managers, service providers, and requesters or user proxies .
Managers can task a service provider to perform certain activities.
Requesters send specific support directives to the service providers. The service providers respond with assigned resources to satisfy that request and can generate an exception event indicating the request cannot be satisfied. Service providers can also act as requesters when they require services from another provider. See Figure 2 for a graphical representation of the relationships of these organizations. User proxies are clusters that represent the individual or business user specified in the particular electronic commerce process.