eBusiness (Week 4)

What is an IP Address?  What is it’s main function?

An Internet Protocol (IP) can be referred to as the basic communication language or protocol of the internet, it is a set of standards that specify the format of data as well as the rules to be followed during transmission. An IP address can either be public or private however each one is unique.
An IP's main function is to allow data to move around the internet.

What is Web 2.0, how does it differ from 1.0?


Web 2.0 is referred to as the Live Web as users are able to build and collaborate their own content. Businesses are using web 2.0 as a way of enabling access to critical business applications for customers and employees.


Web 2.0 has enabled changes, to web 1.0, in the ways software developers and end-users use the web as a platform. Web 2.0 has made the information retrievable by web 1.0, more efficient and relative to the world of business. An example of this is, while web 1.0 showed the number of page views on a particular site, web 2.0 now shows the cost per click on the same site.  

What is Web 3.0?

Web 3.0 builds information about a person using the concept of tagging. The semantic web is an evolving extension of the World Wide Web in which web content can be expressed in a format that can be read and used by software agents. The semantic web provides a framework that allows data to be shared and reused across various applications. 

What is eBusiness, how does it differ from eCommerce?


E-Business is the conducting of business on the internet. While E-Commerce is only the buying and selling of goods over the internet, E-Business also includes serving customers and collaborating with business partners.


What is pure and partial eCommerce?
Pure and Partial E-Commerce means that the product, process or delivery agent can be physical or digital.  


 List and describe the various eBusiness models?


Business to Business (B2B)
Business buying from and selling to each other over the internet


Business to Consumer (B2C)
A business that sells it's products or services to consumers 
over the internet


Consumer to Business (C2B)
Any consumer that sells a product or service to a business 
over the internet


Consumer to Consumer (C2C)
Sites primarily offering goods and services to assist consumers in interacting with each other over the internet 


List and describe the major B2B models?


Sell-Side-E-Marketplace
A web based niche marketplace in which one company sells to many business buyers from e-catalogues or auctions


E-Procurment
The electronic acquisition of goods and services for organisations which allows consumers to buy directly from the supplier


Buyer Side Market Place
A corporate based acquisition site that uses reverse auctions, negotiations, group purchasing or any other e-procurement method. This model automates ordering, fulfillment and sales data analysis.


Outline 2 opportunities and 2 challenges faced by companies doing business online?


Opportunities

• Saving on the cost of running a physical store (eg. rent)           
• Efficient way of monitoring sales 

Challenges

• Handling return of unwanted or damaged goods
• Packaging product efficiently to avoid damage on arrival (DOA) and organising fast delivery to consumer

Strategic Decision Making (Week 3)

Define TPS & DSS, and explain how an organisation can use these systems to make decisions and gain competitive advantages

Transactional Processing Systems (TPS) are systems that automate transactions, most commonly, EFTPOS/Payroll/MYOB. These systems are used at lower levels of organisations as they are the basis for analytical systems.

Decision Support Systems (DSS) are used at higher levels of organisations, they help managers make decisions particularly in relation to more complex problems. DSS provide data for analysis in an organisation, and through the use of complex modelling, also allow managers to solve business issues more efficiently. 

Describe the three quantitative models typically used by decision support systems.

There are 3 quantitative models used by Decision Support Systems include: 

Sensitivity Analysis which is the study of the impact that changes in one part of the model has on other parts of the model. If the model is sensitive then a company could expect to see a decline in sales.


What-If Analysis checks the impact of a change in a proposed solution. 


Goal-Seeking Analysis finds the inputs necessary to achieve a goal. This model looks to the end result and works backward to achieve the final goal.

Describe a business processes and their importance to an organisation.

A business process is a standard set of activities that accomplish a specific task, such as processing a customer order.


An organisations business processes must be studied, understood and continuously improved because an organisation is only as effective as their employed processes.




Compare business process improvement and business process re-engineering.


Business process improvement deals with a continuous improvement model which attempts to understand and measure the current process to implement improvements accordingly.


Business re-engineering on the other hand, is the analysis and redesign of workflow within and between the business. Business re-engineering assumes the current process is irrelevant or does not work and starts building from scratch.

Business Process Re-engineering

Describe the importance of business process modelling (or mapping) and business process models.


Business process modelling (BPM) is the activity of making a detailed flowchart or process map of work processes. BPM is important as it aims to show process details in a gradual and controlled manner. 


Business process modelling and business process models, bring visibility to technology, encourage consciousness of what people are doing in a business and enable analysis. 

Information Systems In Business (Week 2)

Explain information technology’s role in business and describe how you measure success

Information technology is an enabler of business. It facilitates communication and increases business intelligence. It allows for automated processing which improves productivity and accuracy, reduces costs, assists with quality decision making and the speed at which decisions are made. 

Success is measured through the efficiency and effectiveness metrics. 

Efficiency IT metrics measure the performance of the system itself which include throughput, speed and availability. These metrics are able to answer questions such as, how fast the system is, how many transactions per hour and how much capacity the system has. 

Effectiveness IT metrics measure the impact IT has on business activities and processes by considering customer satisfaction and conversion rates. 

Primarily, efficiency focuses on the extent to which an organisation is using its resources while effectiveness focuses on how well an organisation is achieving its goals and objectives. 

List and describe each of the forces in Porter’s Five Forces Model

Michael Porter developed the Five Forces Model which is a useful tool to aid in understanding competition and its implications for business strategies. 

1. Buyer Power

The power of buyers is reflected by their ability to directly impact the price they are willing to pay for an item. Buyer power is high when buyers have many sellers to chose from and low when their choices are few. 

2. Supplier Power

Supplier power is high when one supplier has concentrated power over an industry. When supplier power is high, the supplier can directly influence the industry by charging higher prices and limiting services or quality.

3. Threat of Substitute Products or Services

The threat of substitute products or services is high when there are many alternatives to a product or service and low when there are few alternatives.

4. Threat of New Entrants

The threat of new entrants is high when it is easy for new competitors to enter a market and low when there are significant barriers to entering a market. 

5. Rivalry Among Existing Competitors

Rivalry among existing competitors is high when competition is fierce in a market and low when competition is more settled. 

Describe the relationship between business processes and value chains

Value chain analysis is used to determine the success or failure of an organisation's chosen strategy. Business processes are a standardised set of activities that accomplish a specific task and a value chain views an organisation as a series of processes, each of which add to the product or service. 

Primary value activities acquire raw materials and manufacture, market, sell and provide after sales services. Support value activities support the primary value activities. 

Improving primary activities can decrease the threat of substitutes and improving support activities can decrease the threat of new entrants. 

Compare Porter’s three generic strategies

Porter's three generic strategies are:

1. Broad cost leadership

2. Broad differentiation

3. Focused strategy

Focused strategies target a niche market while broad strategies target a large market segment. A focused strategy ideally concentrates on either cost leadership or cost differentiation. 

Porter suggests that an organisation is wise to adopt only one of the three generic strategies in order to succeed.