Fundamentals of E-Commerce & M-Commerce

Powerpoint Presentations

Unit I

E-Commerce

E-Commerce or Electronics Commerce is a methodology of modern business, which addresses the need of business organizations, vendors and customers to reduce cost and improve the quality of goods and services while increasing the speed of delivery. Ecommerce refers to the paperless exchange of business information using the following ways −

·         Electronic Data Interchange (EDI)

·         Electronic Mail (e-mail)

·         Electronic Bulletin Boards

·         Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT)

·         Other Network-based technologies

Definition

Ecommerce, also known as electronic commerce or internet commerce, refers to the buying and selling of goods or services using the internet, and the transfer of money and data to execute these transactions. Ecommerce is often used to refer to the sale of physical products online, but it can also describe any kind of commercial transaction that is facilitated through the internet.

Forces Fueling e-Commerce

There are at least three major forces fueling e-commerce: economic forces, marketing and customer interaction forces, and technology, particularly multimedia convergence.

Economic forces:

One of the most evident benefits of e-commerce is economic efficiency resulting from the reduction in communications costs, low-cost technological infrastructure, speedier and more economic electronic transactions with suppliers, lower global information sharing and advertising costs, and cheaper customer service alternatives.

Economic integration is either external or internal. External integration refers to the electronic networking of corporations, suppliers, customers/clients, and independent contractors into one community communicating in a virtual environment (with the Internet as medium). Internal integration, on the other hand, is the networking of the various departments within a corporation, and of business operations and processes. This allows critical business information to be stored in a digital form that can be retrieved instantly and transmitted electronically. Internal integration is best exemplified by corporate intranets. Among the companies with efficient corporate intranets are Procter and Gamble, IBM, Nestle and Intel.

Market forces:

Corporations are encouraged to use e-commerce in marketing and promotion to capture international markets, both big and small. The Internet is likewise used as a medium for enhanced customer service and support. It is a lot easier for companies to provide their target consumers with more detailed product and service information using the Internet.

Technology forces:

The development of ICT is a key factor in the growth of e-commerce. For instance, technological advances in digitizing content, compression and the promotion of open systems technology have paved the way for the convergence of communication services into one single platform. This in turn has made communication more efficient, faster, easier, and more economical as the need to set up separate networks for telephone services, television broadcast, cable television, and Internet access is eliminated. From the standpoint of firms/businesses and consumers, having only one information provider means lower communications cost.

Electronic Commerce Framework:         

E-Commerce application will be built on the existing technology infrastructure - a myriad of computers Communication networks Communication software forming information superhighway.

• Common business services for facilitating the buying and selling process
• Messaging & information distribution as a means of sending and retrieving information
• Multimedia content & network publishing, for creating a product & a means to communicate about it
• The information superhighway- the very foundation-for providing the high way system along which all e-commerce must travel

The two pillars supporting all e-commerce applications & infrastructure

• Public policy to govern issues such as universal access,privacy and information pricing.
• Technical standards to dictate the nature of information publishing ,user interfaces and transport in the interest of compatability across the entire network
• Any successful e-commerce will require the I-way infrastructure in the same way that regular commerce needs interstate highway network to carry goods from one point to another
• I-way will be a mesh of interconnected data highways of many forms Telephone,wires,cable TV wire Radio-based wireless-cellular & satellite
• Movies=video + audio
• Digital games=music + video + software
• Electronic books=text + data + graphics + music + photographs + video
• In the electronic highway system‘ multimedia content is stores in the form of electronic documents

These are often digitized On the I-way messaging software fulfills the role, in any no. of forms: e- mail, EDI, or point-to-point file transfers Encryption & authentication methods to ensure security

Electronic payment schemes developed to handle complex transactions. These logistics issues are difficult in long-established transportation.

 

 

Anatomy of E-Commerce applications

 

E-Commerce applications are:

 

·         Multimedia Content for E-Commerce Applications

 

·         Multimedia Storage Servers & E-Commerce Applications

 

o   Client-Server Architecture in Electronic Commerce

 

o   Internal Processes of Multimedia Servers

 

o   Video Servers & E-Commerce

 

·         Information Delivery/Transport & E-Commerce Applications

 

·         Consumer Access Devices