Patent ID: 6901393

Claim:
A method for providing customer-centric collaborative decision making in a business-to-business framework, comprising the steps of: (a) defining a minimum set of attributes; (b) receiving first information regarding each of the minimum set of attributes from a receiving business; (c) receiving second information regarding proposed products or services in terms of the minimum set of attributes, wherein the second information is received from a supplying business; (d) executing a decision process based on the first information and the second information, where the decision process determines as to which products or services is suitable for the receiving business; (e) wherein the steps are carried out using a system capable of: (i) executing an application capable of performing decision logic; (ii) retrieving information from a database in accordance with the decision logic; (iii) receiving information from a user in accordance with the decision logic utilizing a user interface; (iv) processing the information utilizing the decision logic; and (v) wherein (i)-(iv) are carried out by a collaborative decision platform capable of accomplishing (ii)-(iv) for different purposes by executing different applications each capable of performing different decision logic; (f) wherein an application interface provides an interface between the application and the collaborative decision platform, where (ii)-(iv) are carried out using universal modules capable of interfacing with different applications adapted for applying the universal modules to different business sectors; (g) wherein the collaborative decision platform communicates with the application through a standard interface protocol.