Introduction
Mass customization is a business strategy that aims at satisfying individual customer needs with near mass production efficiency. The advances realized in information technology are critical enablers, which make this strategy function efficiently. Information systems can be implemented to support diverse activities in the mass customization value chain. They assist customers during the product specification phase in order to lead them in a fast-paced manner to the product variants corresponding to their individual requirements. Modern information systems, which support open-innovation even enable customers to participate actively in the product design. Furthermore, mass customization information systems contribute to helping companies mitigate excessive product variety and increase costs’ efficiency on the shop floor and logistics through optimal product modeling and production planning and scheduling.

The Overall Objective of the Book
In the fields of mass customization information systems, there exists a need for a book enclosing high quality analyses in this area. The scientific community and professionals both will benefit from a book that focuses on this subject. This book should describe the state-of-the-art, innovative theoretical frameworks, advanced and successful implementations as well as latest empirical research findings in the area. The main objective is to bridge theory and practice on the one hand and to fill research gaps and answer open questions on the other hand. The book will improve the understanding of the problems that are encountered during the conception of information systems for mass customization. Furthermore, it provides solution approaches for the mitigation of these problems and simultaneously highlights new directions for future research.

The Target Audience
The target audience consists of professionals and scientists working in the field of computer science and artificial intelligence. In addition, industrial engineers and researchers in business administration with a special focus on information systems and IT Management will find this book as an adequate reference that describes current research and presents topics that can be more deepened in the future. Graduate students in the mentioned areas will find practical applications of some theoretical concepts that are already discussed in class.

Topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Customer needs’ elicitation

• Personalization and advisory systems

• Product modeling and configuration systems

• Customer Relationship-Management systems

• IT-Systems for Enterprise Resource Planning and Supply Chain Management

• IT-architecture and infrastructure for mass customization

• IT-support for open innovation