Virtual R&D Teams

ollaboration has become more important to global organizations as they handle the increasing dispersal of their activities across space, time, and organizational boundaries. How to get dispersed teams of knowledge workers and decision-makers to work together in more efficient and effective ways has driven organizational adoption and use of collaborative technologies. Collaborative systems support networks of spatially dispersed actors (either humans or not) that play different roles and cooperate to achieve common goals, which are usually non-technological goals. On the other hand, collaboration is obviously enabled by the several technological building blocks that contribute to set up a collaborative system. Traditionally, most of the efforts in the context of collaborative systems have mainly addressed technology issues, while collaboration issues have been dealt with to a very limited extent, more as a side effect of an innovative technology rather than as a driver that brings technology closer to people and organizational needs. This special issue fosters innovative research contributions addressing collaborative systems that help to create the right conditions for effective cooperation and coordination, thereby boosting factors like productivity, innovation and creativity. It will include invited papers from experts from academia, industry, and government as well as contributed papers describing original work on the current state of research in collaborative technologies, collaborative systems and all related issues. The issue aims at presenting the state-of-the-art and future of collaborative technologies and systems. Another aim is discussion of the emergence of integrated collaborative environments, as well as other issues and trends that are influencing the collaboration marketplace.

Nader Ale Ebrahim

Virtual Environments Innovation and R&D Activities: Management Challenges

1. Nader Ale Ebrahim2. Shamsuddin Ahmed3. Zahari Taha

Nader Ale Ebrahim