Exploitable results Computer-based support for legal and other regulatory processes How can organisations design their processes and supporting information systems in a straightforward and consistent way? IST-project E-POWER's system provides a powerful solution; it analyses legal and other regulatory sources, e.g. legislation, case decisions, directives and policy documents, and reduces them to knowledge representations that can be interpreted objectively and checked for consistency and anomalies and also are easily transformed into knowledge based components used for automated support. E-POWER, has developed a computer-based method and supporting tools that can be used in the whole chain of processes for the creation and execution of laws and business rules. Typical application areas are legal domains e.g. pensions and taxes and insurance policies. In these domains knowledge-based computer systems can be used for the execution of the rules. The aim has been to create a transparent system using formal models that work with any original knowledge source. Natural language processing and artificial intelligence are used to reduce the effort required to build these formal models, and this reduces maintenance costs and improves uniformity. Central to the process is the E-POWER workbench, which provides a variety of tools. The structuring tool automatically decomposes textual knowledge sources (e.g. legal sources) and builds a navigation structure using the various types of reference usually found in legal texts. The results are compatible with the Metalex XML-based legal framework, and can be thought of as part of a content management system. The workbench contains a tool that automatically extracts concepts from textual knowledge sources and finally knowledge-based components are generated that represent particular domains of interest. The transparency of legislation is improved through the support of different levels of interpretation and by the uniform method of processing original knowledge sources. The method can reduce the development time of complex knowledge-intensive systems and products using this knowledge base. The E-POWER approach is unique; no other system covers the same field of expertise. E-POWER aims to make its method and approach the market standard for analysing and modelling legal knowledge sources, and to use them for the development of further products. The method can be applied to any business process where legal sources are created or executed, and is currently being used in a number of areas: government, fiscal, personnel benefits, financial regulations for schools, banking and insurance. The E-POWER method has been commercialised. Two partners from the consortium have started a company, called Rulewise, putting the E-POWER approach onto the market. The company is working both in the commercial (banks, insurance) and public (national government, government bodies) sectors. Other partners like the Fraunhofer Institute help to open up the new marketplaces. The system has been successfully used by Fortis Bank in Belgium and in the Pensions Administration section of the Dutch Ministry of Finance. The insurance division at Fortis Bank clarified their policies and improved their household insurance policy using the E-POWER system. Using that system they detected several gaps between what was required under the Belgian law regarding pollution and the cover provided by the insurance policy. Thanks to the E-POWER method, Fortis were able to revise their insurance policy so that it satisfied the various legal requirements. The current version of the system can be used for free, although we may have to make a charge for our distribution costs, and will thus be available to the whole community. The source code will available under specific conditions in a kind of open source configuration. Currently a PPS is developed for further dissemination and development of the results. Searching for OpenAIRE data... There was an error trying to search data from OpenAIRE No results available
