This volume collects the papers that have been presented at the 3rd International Workshop on Formal Ontologies Meet Industry (FOMI 2008), that was held in Turin, Italy, on June 5th and 6th, 2008. FOMI is an international forum where academic researchers and industrial practitioners meet to analyze and discuss issues related to methods, theories, tools and applications based on formal ontologies.

There is today wide agreement that knowledge modeling and the semantic dimension of information plays an increasingly central role in networked economy: semantic-based applications are relevant in distributed systems such as networked organizations, organizational networks, and in distributed knowledge management. These knowledge models in industry aim to provide a framework for information and knowledge sharing, reliable information exchange, meaning negotiation and coordination between distinct organizations or among members of the same organization.

New tools and applications have been and are being developed in diverse application fields, ranging from business to medicine, from engineering to finance, from law to electronics. All these systems have exploited the theoretical results and the practical experience of previous work. In many cases, it has been shown that formal ontologies play a central role in describing in a common and understandable way the logical and practical features of the application domain.

The success of the methodologies associated with knowledge modeling and ontologies led to increased need of a comparison between different approaches and results, with the aim of evaluating the interdependencies between theories and methods of formal ontology and the activities, processes, and needs of enterprise organizations.

The FOMI 08 Workshop aims to advance in this direction by bringing together researchers and practitioners interested in ontology application, paying particular attention to the topics listed below.

• Ontology and business: ontology and ontological methodologies in business; adaptation of ontologies for companies and organizations; ontology effectiveness and evaluation in business

• Ontology and enterprise: ontology-driven enterprise modeling; ontology development and change within organizations; ontology-driven representation of products, services, functionalities, design, processes;

• Ontology and enterprise knowledge: ontologies for the know-how; ontologies for corporate knowledge;

• Ontology in practice: ontologies for electronic catalogs, e-commerce, e-government; ontologies for marketing; ontologies for finance; ontologies for engineering; ontologies for medical sciences;

• Ontology and linguistics: ontology-driven linguistic representation in organization knowledge; linguistic problems in standards and in codification processes; ontologies and multilingualism in business and organizations.

12 papers were selected for presentation at the conference. Beyond them, this volume also includes abstracts of the talks given by the invited speakers, who are Hans Akkermans, from the Vrije Universiteit of Amsterdam and Wernher Behrendt, from Salzburg Research Forschungsgesellschaft. We thank them for having accepted the invitation to participate in the workshop. We also thank all the members of the Program Committee for their work and for their suggestions. Finally, we would like to thank the members of the Local Organization Committee, Daniele Radicioni, Alessandro Mazzei, Cristina Bosco and Serena Villata: without their tireless activity the Workshop would not have been possible.

Stefano Borgo, Leonardo Lesmo