To keep a network of enterprises sustainable, inter-organizational control measures are needed to detect or prevent opportunistic behaviour of network participants. We present a requirements engineering method for understanding control problems and designing solutions, based on an economic value perspective. The methodology employs a library of so-called control patterns, inspired by design patterns in software engineering. A control pattern is a generic solution for a common control problem. The usefulness and adequacy of the control patterns is demonstrated by a case study of the governance and control mechanisms of the Dutch public health insurance network for exceptional medical expenses (AWBZ). © 2010 Operational Research Society Ltd. All rights reserved

Companies are required by law to report all kinds of information to various public agencies. Since most public agencies are autonomous and define their information demands independent of each other, companies have to report information to various agencies in different ways. Accordingly, governments are initiating programs that aim to transform business-to government information exchange to reduce the administrative burden for companies and improve the accountability at the same time. Yet little research is available on the type of transformations needed and the role of the infrastructure. Drawing on a case study, this paper investigates the interplay between technical infrastructure and transformation. In this case study an information brokerage infrastructure based on the Extensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) was developed providing a one stop shop for companies and public agencies. The case study shows that the infrastructure should be flexible enough to accommodate changes over time but stable enough to attract a large user-base. The increase in efficiency and effectiveness of information exchange processes requires extensive transformation from both public and private parties.