Embedded Autonomous Agents in Products Supporting Repair and Recycling

This paper describes a concept where products are equipped with agents that will assist in recycling and repairing the product. These so-called product agents represent the product in cyberspace and are capable to negotiate with other products in case of recycling or repair. Some product agents of broken products will offer spare parts, other agents will look for spare parts to repair a broken product. On the average this will enlarge the lifetime of a product and in some cases prevent wasting resources. Apart from reuse of spare parts these agents will also help to locate rare elements in a device, so these elements can be recycled more easily.