height="113" alt="https://img-cdn.thepublive.com/filters:format(webp)/vnd/media/post_attachments/206d392131f63f97fb8380d0b3b216d1f83e45f151bad769eed50a1edcb65b5b.gif (8472 bytes)"> Ravi Marwaha, managing director and CEO, Tata IBM Ltd |
E-business is what happens
when you combine the broad reach of Internet with the vast resources of traditional
Information Technology (IT) systems. It is dynamic and interactive. The scope of
E-business is broad, spanning the spectrum from private intranets, through shared
extranets, to the public Internet. It uses the web to bring together customers, vendors,
suppliers, and employees in a way that had never been possible before.
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E-business offers innumerable
opportunities. Companies around the world already buy and sell over Internet. They connect
with their customers, sales people, suppliers, and shareholders. E-business is about
web-enabling your core business processes to improve customer service, reduce cycle time,
and get better results from the existing resources. It offers new opportunities, needs,
rules, and challenges.
It is certain that E-business will
encompass every single business, no matter the size. Future successful companies will be
those that recognize today the benefits of linking their businesses to new customers and
partners via the Internet—benefits in purchasing, in leveraging information, and in
reaching new markets. The efficiency with which companies process transactions will be the
key business differentiator in the world of E-business. And, E-business will make every IT
system mission-critical. It will connect all the IT systems together in a global network
and customers will talk to business, and businesses will talk to their suppliers entirely
through the medium of the electronic global network.
SIZE="4">E-business offers innumerable opportunities. Companies around the world |
While this provides innumerable
opportunities for companies to find new markets and build on their existing market
presence, E-business connects them to the outside world like never before. As a natural
corollary, organizations will critically look into the IT systems that support their
business goals. The need will arise for a well-managed, robust, and reliable IT
infrastructure that can support innovative applications and possess the flexibility to
move quickly to meet new challenges in a dynamic market.
According to a 1997 Meta Group study,
expenditure on Internet applications has yielded a substantial positive return on
investment. On an average,
-
$1 invested in customer
service, commerce or collaboration returns at least $1.40. -
$1 invested in inventory
management returns $1.53. -
$1 invested in database access
returns $1.68.
Here are some interesting examples that
demonstrate the benefits of E-business.
The University of Minnesota’s
Internet Student Registration System, used by almost 80 percent of students to do
everything from choosing and registering for classes, to calculating financial aid, is
going national under the auspices of IBM. IBM will market a program based on the
University’s system, called Student Server, to other post-secondary institutions. The
system allows students to browse through class lists, pursue class summaries, check out
professors backgrounds, and call up maps and even photos of classroom buildings. Students
can search for all the classes for that quarter and can pose "what if" questions
about financial aid and grade-point averages to plan their education. Web registration has
pretty much eliminated lines at the registrar’s office.
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A unit of FDX Corp., Roberts Express, is
the largest surface expedited carrier in North America. Time itself is the most valuable
commodity the company handles as most shipments consist of time-specific material. For
example, a customer may call Roberts Express because an unexpected shortage of
material—anything from automotive components to the sticky tabs on disposal
diapers—threatens to shut down a production line.
face="Times New Roman">By the year 2000, the Internet connections in India are expected to |
The company has carved out a small, vital
niche in the huge transportation industry. Satellite communications and a highly
specialized database application enable 250 customer service agents working in Akron,
Ohio, to manage the 1,600-truck fleet with great precision. Once Roberts Express picks up
a shipment, the same truck and driver team travels non-stop to its final destination.
Progress is monitored continuously via a truck-mounted satellite dish linked to the
company’s database application.
The job of the customer service agent is
to take customer calls, dispatch vehicles, monitor shipments, and keep customers updated
on the status of their shipments. Since each shipment goes straight through with no stops,
agents must react immediately to a problem on the road.
ABB India has used IBM’s hardware and
software technology to set up an intranet that connects to ABB world-wide. At ABB
Durgapur, the drawing approval cycle has been reduced by more than 50 percent after
adopting the intranet technology.
Malayala Manorama uses a variety of
E-business applications developed using Lotus Domino.
In Tata IBM, we use intranet technology
within the organization for capital expenditure management, sales force automation,
partnerInfo, etc. We have developed templates around this area which can be customized for
our Indian customers.
Today, there are about
60,000 Internet connections in India. By the year 2000, this figure is expected to reach
1.3 million. This offers great opportunities for the growth of E-business in the country.
E-business is a powerful tool. Each of us will have to decide how we will exploit it, and
how soon. Organizations that do this most effectively will create enormous competitive
advantage into the 21st century.