For the development of enterprise information systems, the utilisation of a suitable methodology is essential, providing necessary methods and techniques for modelling the business domain and for designing the supporting information systems. Several methodologies exist and are widely applied in practice nowadays, but most of them lack a theoretical foundation. In this paper, we demonstrate an information system development methodology based on the notions of enterprise ontology and business components, and explain it within the conceptual framework called the generic system development process. The methodology allows for reduction of complexity of domain models and for identification of stable business components.