Infrastucture and Policy Frameworks for the Support of Intelligent Enterprises

Singapore has put in place an advanced broadband telecommunications infrastructure in both the landline and wireless domains to support the growth of intelligent enterprises in the new economy. A pro-business environment modeled on a slew of policy frameworks, the presence of an e-government, and the entrenching of a transparent e-commerce ecosystem, have led to the rise of intelligent enterprises as well as encouraged other businesses to re-engineer various aspects of their operations to tap new business opportunities and improve their operational efficiencies. M-commerce initiatives are also helping to fuel the growth of online commerce. The need for state intervention to drive growth and applications has been found to be very important.

E-Business Systems Security for Intelligent Enterprise

Security issues became a topic of research with the introduction of networked information systems in the early eighties. However, in the mid-nineties the proliferation of the Internet in the business area exposed security as one of key-factors for successful on-line business. The majority of efforts to provide security were focused on technology. However, it turned out during the last years that human factors play a central role. Therefore, this chapter gives a methodology for proper risk management that is concentrated on human factors management, but it starts with addressing classical, i.e. technology based issues. Afterwards, business dynamics is deployed to enable a quantitative approach for handling security of contemporary information systems. The whole methodology encompasses business intelligence and presents appropriate architecture for human resources management.

Linking E-Commerce Strategies with Organizational and IS/IT Strategies

E-commerce strategies are not easy to create or deploy. The environmental uncertainties and the dynamics associated with the strategic context make it all the more important for organizations to carve out a clear e-commerce strategy. Such clarity is desirable to ensure that organizations not only not lose out on new opportunities, but also that they take the requisite steps that are necessary to remain viable players in their existing value chains—that are slowly morphing into value webs or constellations. There are multiple typologies of e-commerce strategies. In the e-commerce context, strategies are closely related to the notion of “business models” (to the extent that they are used interchangeably also). In this chapter, we will seek to understand the essence of e-commerce in a strategic context. We will also develop a framework to understand e-commerce and relate that to theories and case studies. We discuss the state of knowledge in e-commerce strategies and understand how developing and deploying an e-commerce strategy is like chasing a moving and changing target.

A Framework of Intelligence Infrastructure Supported by Intelligent Agents

In this chapter, we establish a conceptual framework for intelligence infrastructure, which is an indispensable foundation to intelligent enterprises. Intelligence infrastructure is defined as information technology based facilities, systems, and services that support effective and efficient decision making at all levels of an organization. Intelligent agents, or autonomous computer programs, have emerged in recent years as a key component to organizational intelligence infrastructure. We review intelligent agents research and applications, identify their role in intelligence infrastructure, discuss the concepts and issues behind the intelligent agent supported intelligence infrastructure, and point out future developments.

The Evolving E-Business Enterprise Systems Suite

Enterprise systems have emerged recently as a popular approach to outsourcing major application development. In the 1990s, enterprise systems encompassed and integrated core business functions such as manufacturing, logistics, financials, and human resources. During this time, the basic objective of these systems was on streamlining and standardizing information flows and processes. These systems were designed based on the need to optimize the processing of huge numbers of business transactions regularly in an enterprise. As the Internet evolved there has been a greater emphasis on supporting inter-organizational processes. As technologies continue to advance and users become more sophisticated, a greater opportunity to incorporate higher-level decision making tools and capabilities into enterprise systems packages arises. This chapter provides a review of several core areas currently being developed. The view of the authors is that enterprise systems as they are evolving today will serve as the foundation for the intelligent enterprise of the 21st century. The last section provides a perspective on how firms should view these systems and their many challenges.

A Comparative Analysis of eBay and Amazon

Even though Amazon.com has received most of the initial hype and publicity surrounding e-commerce, eBay has quietly built an innovative business truly suited to the Internet. Initially, Amazon sought to merely replicate a catalog business model online. Its technology may have been innovative- but its business model was not. On the other hand, eBay recognized the unique nature of the Internet and enabled both buying and selling online with spectacular results. Its auction format was a winner. eBay also clearly demonstrated that profits do not have to come in the way of growth—an argument that Bezos never tired of making. Amazon was initially focused on BN.com as a competitor. Over time, Amazon came to recognize eBay as the competitor. Its initial foray into auctions was a spectacular failure. Now, Amazon is trying to compete with eBay by facilitating selling and strengthening its affiliates program.

Managing Operations in the E-Commerce Era

Of the many innovations that have impacted humanity during the last millennium, the Internet can be considered by far the most pervasive: It is transforming different facets of human activity, not the least of which are business transactions. One of the fundamental issues that a given firm’s management seeks to address, is how best to utilize input resources to provide customers with goods and services of higher value, thus generating profits and increasing market share. To facilitate activities embodied in this transformation process, a growing number of firms now use the Internet. This chapter analyzes the interrelationship between e-commerce and operations, and assesses the role operations should play to ensure the success of business-to-consumer and business-to-business e-commerce. It also proposes how to address key issues in order to harness the full capability of the Internet for commerce.

The Macroeconomic Benefits of Intelligent Enterprises

New information technologies, including e-commerce and the Internet, have brought fundamental changes to 21st century businesses by making more and better information available quickly and inexpensively. Intelligent enterprises are those firms that make the most from new information technologies and Internet business solutions to increase revenue and productivity, hold down costs, and expand markets and opportunities. In this chapter, the macroeconomic benefits that intelligent enterprises can have on the U.S. economy are explored. We find that the U.S. economy has become less volatile, with demand volatility nearly matching sales volatility, particularly in the durable goods sector. Evidence also suggests that firms are utilizing new information technologies to lower inventory levels relative to sales, leading to higher productivity growth, lower prices, and more competitive markets.

Modern Maintenance Management for Enhancing Organizational Efficiency

In this chapter, we explore the impact of modern maintenance management on the global organizational efficiency of an intelligent enterprise. In order to do so, we first define the concept of maintenance management, its scope, and complexity. We also define the company’s organizational efficiency as a suitable balance of each of these competencies: product, process and relationship. The chapter describes how this function may impact a company’s competencies in product and processes. To be effective, maintenance function requires the proper development of relationship competencies with technological partners, suppliers and the end customers. Therefore, this chapter proposes a comprehensive maintenance management framework that integrates various existing approaches to maintenance management. We also discuss useful practices to reach the competencies needed to be effective in the maintenance function of intelligent enterprises.

E-Pricing for Intelligent Enterprises

Setting the right price has a lot to do with assessing value. Understanding value is a direct result of understanding customers. Intelligent enterprises should use the power of the Internet to collect and process information to rethink their pricing strategy and gear it to customer perception of value. This chapter explores the impact of the Internet on pricing and demonstrates that rather than pushing prices universally downward and squeezing margins, the Internet provides unique opportunities in pricing to enhance margins and generate growth. It expounds on the low-online pricing myth and the dimensions of e-price improvement. Some models of real time and dynamic pricing are explored and implications for theory and practice are discussed.