Tutorial 1:

1. In your own words, provide definitions for electronic commerce and electronic business. Are they essentially the same, similar, or different concepts? Explain. Sol: The buying and selling of products and services by businesses and consumers over the internet is called e-commerce. Subdivided into three categories: business to business or B2B (Cisco), business to consumer or B2C (Amazon), and consumer to consumer or C2C (eBay). A type of business model, or segment of a larger business model, that enables a firm or individual to conduct business over an electronic network, typically the internet. Electronic commerce operates in all four of the major market segments: business to business, business to consumer, consumer to consumer and consumer to business. Firm which in contrast to an electronic commerce firm, conducts its day-to-day business functions over the internet and/or other electronic networks such as electronic data interchange (EDI). Electronic business includes collaborating with distributors on sales promotions, interacting with and servicing the customers, and conducting joint research with business partners.

2. How might an e-business make use of an electronic community of users to enhance its operations? Sol: Electronic commerce -- often called e-commerce -- refers to conducting business using the Internet as the mechanism to complete the transaction. For businesses looking to profit from the exploding ecommerce trend, there are many opportunities and business models that can be implemented to generate revenue.

There are many behind-the-scenes elements that make e-commerce work. Companies that provide these infrastructure services can be successful, profitable and invisible to the end-user consumer. The tracking abilities afforded by the Internet allow for advertisers to pay for a valid inquiry, lead or even a customer. Companies with experience and expertise in a certain industry often have success getting paid for each lead or customer they bring to their advertising clients. Publishers of information, particularly specialty content, often offer access to this premium information via a subscription model.

Selling tangible products online is one of the simplest forms of e-commerce. A merchant creates a website and offers products for sale with a shopping cart and the ability to process payments in realtime. 3. Sol: Reasons: The multiple regression analysis results indicate that relative advantage, compatibility, complexity; observe ability and security appear significant. Relative advantage and compatibility have positive and significant influence on EC adoption whereas complexity and security have negative effects. A greater understanding of managers perception of e-commerce adoption in their manufacturing companies will interested in promoting their business online may find these results helpful in guiding their efforts. Factors affecting adoption of e-commerce in small- and medium-sized enterprises in Jordan. The results show that within the environmental context two factors have importance in e-commerce adoption in Jordan: customer pressure and quality of ICT consulting services. This study has found that the influence of government is inexistent or at least very limited Factors affecting the adoption of e-commerce, For example regarding g e-commerce barriers SMEs believed that e-commerce leads to productivity decrease mainly due to employees using email service for their own purposes, too much junk e-mail, they stated that e-mail service is being a mean of constant interruption and distraction. Other factors that have emerged as barriers in these companies are vendor lock-in and threat of disintermediation, lack of trust in the banks support for electronic transactions, and fear of theft of identity. 4. Sol: The adoption of e-business by the Australian construction industry lags other service and product industries. It is assumed that slow adoption rate does not reflect the maturity of the technology but is due to adoption barriers peculiar to the nature of construction. This paper examines impediments to the uptake of e-business nationally and internationally. A systematic and extensive literature search of barriers (also referred to as obstacles, impediments or hindrances) to adoption has been undertaken and the findings discussed in this paper. This review included more that 200 documents and these have been published in a searchable database as part of a larger research initiative funded by the Cooperative Research Centre for Construction Innovation. The influence of levels of e-business maturity seen in other sectors such as retail, tourism and manufacturing was also captured and a number of major barriers were identified some including: privacy, trust, uncertainty of financial returns, lack of reliable measurement, fraud, lack of support and system maintenance. A total of 23 barriers were assessed in terms of impact to organizational type and What might the barriers to adoption of e-business be for an Australian organization? Outline the reasons why an organization may wish to adopt e-commerce.

size across reviewed documents. With this information it was possible to develop a reference framework for measuring maturity levels and readiness to uptake e-business in construction.

Tutorial 2:
1. In your own words, describe what is meant by the concept e-business model. Sol: The e-Business model, like any business model, describes how a company functions; how it provides a product or service, how it generates revenue, and how it will create and adapt to new markets and technologies. It has four traditional components as shown in the figure, The e-Business Model. These are the e-business concept, value proposition, sources of revenue, and the required activities, resources, and capabilities. In a successful business, all of its business model components work together in a cooperative and supportive fashion. The e-business concept describes the rationale of the business, its goals and vision, and products or offerings from which it will earn revenue. A successful concept is based on a market analysis that identifies customers likely to purchase the product and how much they are willing to pay for it.

2. From your readings, and own experience, is the taxonomy for e-business models introduced in lectures (Chaffey 2009:26) (a) a complete, and (b) reasonable way of describing e-business models? Explain. Sol: The terms typology and taxonomy are used interchangeably in the electronic commerce literature when referring to business model classification schemes. This paper identifies the business model classification schemes present in the electronic commerce literature along with the criteria by which the business models are classified. Drawing on the broader classification literature, the utility of these classifications is examined and a distinction is made between typologies and taxonomies. The utility of typologies is examined and a case for the development of a general taxonomy of business models is presented. 3. How do infomediaries fit into the taxonomy proposed in Chaffey (2009:26)? Sol: Taxonomy

As you can see, simple knowledge is at the bottom of the pyramid. Just knowing a fact is not a particularly difficult feat, cognitively speaking. More important is understanding that fact, applying it, analyzing it, and so on. Look at the following verbs that can be used with the different levels of Bloom's pyramid. Some are considered low level thinking skills and some higher level 5. Using a search engine, find and record at least one unique websites for each type of e-business in the table underneath, and: a. in your own words, provide a description of that business model (eg: e-tailers transact sales of merchandise via the web either as a main business or an add-on to a catalogue or retail stores); b. identify the typical stakeholders involved in this form of e-business (eg: e-tail involve businesses, customers, and third-party service providers) c. identify the typical nature of these relationships (eg: e-tail relationships between business and customers are transactional one-time and return, relationships between businesses and third-party providers are contractual) d. identify the likely revenue model(s) adopted by this e-business

e-business model

Web Address

Descriptio n of Model

Typical Stakeholde rs Involved

Typical Nature of Relationshi ps

Revenu e Model

Governme nt Content Provider eCommunity e-Tailer Service Provider

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/index.h tm http://www.netlingo.com/ http://login.ecommunity.com/ http://www.etrailer.com/comments. aspx http://www.sitegalore.com/

Tutorial3: 1. Describe the key characteristics of an e-business strategy model. Sol: They include web sites, browsers, electronic procurement software, desk-top video conferencing tools, intelligent database search engines, computer supported co-operative working packages, and many other technologies, as well as the web-enabling of more traditional and familiar software such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Systems. The Internet itself is just a collection of computers networked together using public telephone lines, leased lines and other equipment (for example, routers that direct packets of information to their destination). These new forces, Globalization, Digitalization and Deregulation, each describe certain characteristics of the environment of an e Business economy.

2.

Is strategic planning important for e-business? Explain.

Sol: Strategic planning determines where an organization is headed over the next year or more, how it's going to get there and how it will know if the results are successful. There are a variety of perspectives, models and approaches used in strategic planning. The way that a strategic plan is developed is dependent on the nature of the organization's leadership, culture of the organization, size of the organization, complexity of the organization's environment and expertise of planners. Goals-based planning is perhaps the most common strategic planning model and begins with focus on the organization's mission and vision and strategies to achieve these goals. Strategic planning is critical to business success. Different from classic business planning, the strategic variety involves vision, mission and outside-of-the-box thinking. Strategic planning describes where you want your company to go, not necessarily how you're going to get there. However, like all other "travel plans," without knowing where you want to go, creating details on how to arrive are meaningless. Strategic planning defines the "where" that your company is heading. 3. Define the main reasons e-business strategy might fail.

Sol: E-business simply refers to an online business devoted to profits through the sale of products and services. In the real world, a majority of small business startups fail because they get overwhelmed with overhead expenses. On the net, this is less of a problem if you can do any of the work yourself, such as building pages for your site. Even if you cant, most sites do not fail because of expenses. There are plenty of other reasons. E-Business failures almost always have a common denominator. The issue involves traffic. On the net, traffic refers to the number of visitors a site gets. Most e-businesses fail to properly research whether there is enough traffic for their area of business before building out their site. The first step is always to research whether people are actually searching for your business service or product. You can look under the keyword category in our article section to learn more. The second area where e-business failures occur involves ignoring the keywords in question. Once you have a keyword list, you must focus on it. The list is telling you what problem people have in your field and you must supply them with a solution to each specific problem. If you do not provide the services or products indicated by certain keywords, figure out how to offer them. If you give prospects what they want, they will return to your site over and over again. Return visitors are the key to making profits. Many e-business failures occur because sites bite off more than they can chew. The temptation is to go for the broadest subject matter possible. This is a mistake. You should focus on a niche. If you want to open an online bookstore, you will never be able to compete with Amazon. Amazon simply has far too big of a head start. If you focus on books devoted just to a certain subject, such as Eastern philosophy or home improvement, you have a good chance of making a profit. This can occur because fans of the niche will come to your site instead of Amazon since you focus entirely on the niche in question. E-business failures occur because people simply do not take the time to properly research the situation before jumping in with both feet. Take your time and full understand your market and what you are getting into. If you are patient and thorough, you will not become one of the e-business failures dotting the net. 4. What is meant by the term privacy paradox? How might it influence planning for e-businesses? Sol: Privacy on the Internet has become a much debated topic in recent years. Public opinion regarding the invasion of privacy hasnt wavered much and when it comes to the intrusion of privacy, most people are not aware of how often their rights are violated. You may need to think again when it comes to boasting that you keep your personal data private. A 2005Pew Internet Study showed that fifty four percent believe that websites that track their behavior online invade their privacy. The same study showed a contradicting behaviour sixty three percent would give up personal information to get access to a web site. Similarly, a 2003 Annenberg study showed that eighty five percent of users disapproved of web sites displaying advertisements based on their web history. Research on SNS and other social media found a paradox, a discrepancy between privacy concerns and actual privacy settings (Barnes, 2006). Analyses of profiles have found that SNS users provide a large amount of personal information on public profiles. Gross and Acquits (2005) analyzed the Facebook profiles of more than 4000 students and found that only a small percentage had changed the default privacy settings. The wall (2008) analyzed more than 20,000 MySpace profiles and found that only 27% were set to private. In 2007, Lewis et al. (2008) downloaded the Facebook profiles of a whole class of a

private American university and found that only one third was set to private. A similar percentage has been reported in a study on Hyves users, also conducted in 2007 (Utz, 2008). 5. Identify and describe, in your own words, the principal steps in planning for an e-business? Sol: Starting a business online, like any other business venture, requires a degree of planning as to how it will fit into an overall business strategy. While most businesses focus on the technical aspect of launching an online business, the all-encompassing issue of an e-business strategy is most important good planning will allow your business to leverage opportunities and reduce the risk of failure. To develop your online business, create an e-business plan. Though your online business plan should be tailored to suit your business individual circumstances, there are certain aspects your should consider including, such as: 1. Description / executive summary This section should introduce and summarise your e-business plan. Cover how you are currently using the internet in your business and how you would like to be using it within a designated period (such as within two to five years). Then, outline the aim, how it will affect your business and a brief of the overall implementation plan. 2. Rationale / explanation This involves a rational explanation of the aim of your e-business, how these are complementary to the overall strategy of the business and how these will be beneficial to stakeholders in the business. 3. Management In this section, detail who is responsible for the e-business, including a reporting hierarchy showing who is ultimately responsible and who deals with day-to-day management. As well as this, outline the management strategy (such as committees and meeting frequency) and a proposed schedule of the implementation of your online business. 4. Business strategy Next, look at how the online business will impact other aspects of the business. In particular, look at how it will impact the organisations marketing and operations strategy 5. SWOT Like any aspect of the business, do a SWOT for the online business, looking at any strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. This should also touch upon the benefits and challenges that may be encountered when implementing any new systems. 6. Resources Then, look at the resources needed to execute the plan and what resources you have already which can be allocated to your online business. These resources include people (outlining any specific expertise needed), equipment and capital. Also, explore whether outsourcing is possible for any of these. 7. Summary

Finally, summarise the plan, reiterating any measurable goals, the overall aim and who is responsible clearly for easy reference. In having a detailed, structured plan before action is taking, the greater likelihood you can play to your strengths, compensate for weaknesses and identify opportunities and better the chances of the success of your business online.

6. What are some of the main considerations for the implementation phase of planning an e-tailer website? Sol: Whether making an e-commerce website or doing a full-scale build one of the most important parts in the whole process is planning . Planning a build before you start can sometimes seem like a bit of a tedious and time-consuming task, but not only will it make everything run a lot smoother, it will also save a lot of time. What Do You Want Your Site To Do? Whos Going to Buy From You? Do You Require Special Site Features? What Are Your Limitations? Do You Have All the Tools You Need? What E-Commerce Platform Are You Going to Use? Content Management Systems With E-Commerce Addons Custom E-Commerce Site

Tutorial 4:
1. Describe the architecture of the internet. Sol: The Internet system consists of a number of interconnected packet networks supporting communication among host computers using the Internet protocols. These protocols include the Internet Protocol (IP), the Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP), the Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP), and a variety transport and application protocols that depend upon them. As was described in Section [1.2], the Internet Engineering Steering Group periodically releases an Official Protocols memo listing all the Internet protocols. All Internet protocols use IP as the basic data transport mechanism. IP is a datagram, or connectionless, internetwork service and includes provision for addressing, type-of-service specification, fragmentation and reassembly, and security. ICMP and IGMP are considered integral parts of IP, although they are architecturally layered upon IP. ICMP provides error reporting, flow control, first-hop router redirection, and other maintenance and control functions. IGMP provides the mechanisms by which hosts and routers can join and leave IP multicast groups. Reliable data delivery is provided in the Internet protocol suite by Transport Layer protocols such as the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), which provides end-end retransmission, resequencing and

connection control. Transport Layer connectionless service is provided by the User Datagram Protocol (UDP). 2. What are an intranet and an extranet? Describe some of the uses of each type of network for your school at the University of Ballarat. Sol: Intranet is the generic term for a collection of private computer networks within an organization. An intranet uses network technologies as a tool to facilitate communication between people or work groups to improve the data sharing capability and overall knowledge base of an organization's employees. Intranets utilize standard network hardware and software technologies like Ethernet, WiFi, TCP/IP, Web browsers and Web servers. An organization's intranet typically includes Internet access but is firewalled so that its computers cannot be reached directly from the outside. A common extension to intranets, called extranets, opens this firewall to provide controlled access to outsiders. An extranet is a private virtual space to securely collaborate, share information or integrate operations with travelling teams, suppliers, vendors, partners, or customers. A few examples are a sales extranet containing order forms and client directories for the sales team, a partner extranet enabling management of joint tasks, or a customer extranet portal where you collaborate on specifications documents with clients. 3. Describe the main types of wired network media, and any notable limitations. Sol: Communication across a network is carried on a medium. The medium provides the channel over which the message travels from source to destination. Modern networks primarily use three types of media to interconnect devices and to provide the pathway over which data can be transmitted. These media are: 1. Metallic wires within cables 2. Glass or plastic fibers (fiber optic cable) 3. Wireless transmission

Choosing the cables necessary to make a successful LAN or WAN connection requires consideration of the different media types. As you recall, there are many different Physical layer implementations that support multiple media types: UTP (Category 5, 5e, 6, and 7) Fiber-optics Wireless Each media type has its advantages and disadvantages. Some of the factors to consider are: Cable length - Does the cable need to span across a room or from building to building? Cost - Does the budget allow for using a more expensive media type? Bandwidth - Does the technology used with the media provide adequate bandwidth?

Ease of installation - Does the implementation team have the ability to install the cable or is a vendor required? Susceptible to EMI/RFI - Is the local environment going to interfere with the signal? 4. Describe the main types of wireless networks, and any notable limitations.

Sol: Wireless methods do not use electrical (cables) or optical (fiber optics) conductors. It uses the earths electromagnetic frequency spectrum. [2] There are three main types of wireless media: radio wave, microwave, and infrared. Radio wave transmission systems The range of the electromagnetic spectrum between 10 KHz and 1 GHz is called radio frequency (RF). Radio waves include; short wave, very-high-frequency (VHF) television and FM radio, and ultra-highfrequency (UHF) radio and television. Most radio frequencies are regulated and to use these frequencies you must receive a license from the Federal Communications Commission. Getting this license can take some time, cost is also a factor and it makes it hard to move equipment. However, the license does guarantee that within your approved area you will have a clear radio transmission. Microwave Transmission Systems Microwave communications makes use of the lower gigahertz frequencies of the electromagnetic spectrum. These frequencies are higher than radio frequencies and produce better throughput and performance. There are two types of microwave data communications: terrestrial and satellite. Infrared Transmission Systems Infrared media uses infrared light to transmit signals. LEDs or Lasers transmit the signals and photodiodes receive the signals. Examples of these devices are the remote controls we have for our TVs and VCRs. They use the infrared technology to send and receive signals. Infrared signals transmit in the terahertz range. This higher frequency has a good throughput, the down side is the signals cannot penetrate walls or other objects. Also, they are diluted by any strong light source. Making the Wireless Connection In general, wireless connections are the same as wired connections. Applications, workstation operating systems, network operating systems, and client/server applications work just as they do on wired networks. [2] The difference is the speed of the signal transmissions on the different type of connections. Most network situations the speed wont be noticeable because the network will operate at the speed of the slowest component. This is usually the personal computer equipment, which cannot drive transmission rates much higher than 1 Mbps. 5. What type of network might be best suited to a courier van business? Explain.

Sol: One way that you can quickly and easily expand your business is by joining a network. By doing this you will be able to grow in a number of ways: You may be able to find qualified drivers to sub-contract your work to so that you don't have to continuously train up your staff (which can be costly).

You may also be able to take on jobs you would not otherwise have the capacity to accept and win larger contracts. You may find that you are able to take on jobs further afield across Europe by connecting with other members, taking your business further. Generally, a network like this may allow you to become more versatile in your offerings, helping you to grow your business further in a relatively short amount of time. 6. What are four important considerations for e-businesses in deciding between wired or wireless networks? Sol: 1. Network uptime and availability A few minutes of down time in the financial world can mean millions of dollars lost in the blink of an eye. Failed transactions, miscommunication or network unavailability of any kind can be detrimental to any type of financial organization. 2. Compliance requirements Too frequently, organizations evaluate IT security tools solely on technical features instead of first evaluating the ability of a product to solve a business need or enforce an administrative requirement. 3. Support for the current environment and advanced integration for the future Finding a network access control product that supports the current network environment probably sounds like a "duh" statement, but you'd be surprised at how many organizations begin evaluating particular options before they have a perfectly clear understanding of how all the NAC puzzle pieces will fit together. 4. Granular endpoint integrity Breaking into a highly secured bank infrastructure through a firewall proves to be much more difficult than going for softer targets, such as the uneducated user on the network. 5. Longevity and roadmaps Last, but certainly not least, the one major consideration all organizations should take into account is the longevity of the product and the vendor's roadmap for supporting it. There's no clearly defined leader in the NAC space right now; vendors are all scratching and clawing their way to be the top. 7. What issues does an e-business need to consider for registering a domain? Explain. Sol: As a business owner you really need to consider purchasing a business domain name to appear as a professional and creditable business. Small business owners often start out with free web hosting provided by their internet service provider or through one of the free web hosting sites. Also when starting out, new business owners have a tendency to use their email address provided through their internet service provider or use a free email address service. We are all on a tight budget when starting a new business but a business domain name is one of the things that should not be scrimped on. Registering a domain name is so economical now, there is no excuse for not securing a domain name for your business right from the start. Not ready for a website yet, no problem. Some domain registrars will still provide you with a domain email address to use. If the domain registrar does not include an domain email address for you to use you can still get email only web hosting to get your business off to a professional looking business.

Tutorial 5: 2. Distinguish between vertical integration and virtual integration. Sol: Horizontal integration is the process of merging similar industries, industries that produce similar products. Horizontal integration would include tactics like buying competing companies that produce the same goods as you do. Vertical integration is the process of buying out suppliers of that particular industry. For example, a steel company would have an advantage over competitors by vertical integration if that company bought out places like coal fields or iron mines, places that competing steel companies rely on to make their steel. This would let you control the raw materials and transportation systems. The main difference is that horizontal integration buys the competing companies while vertical integration aims at the raw material sources necessary to produce that product 3. Describe, in your own words, the concept of supply chain management. Sol: Supply chain management (SCM) is the oversight of materials, information, and finances as they move in a process from supplier to manufacturer to wholesaler to retailer to consumer. Supply chain management involves coordinating and integrating these flows both within and among companies. It is said that the ultimate goal of any effective supply chain management system is to reduce inventory (with the assumption that products are available when needed). As a solution for successful supply chain management, sophisticated software systems with Web interfaces are competing with Web-based application service providers (ASP) who promise to provide part or all of the SCM service for companies who rent their service. Supply chain management flows can be divided into three main flows: The product flow The information flow The finances flow 4. Distinguish between buy-side e-procurement and marketplace procurement. Sol: E-procurement systems during the E-commerce boom to control, simplify, and automate the purchase of goods and services from multiple suppliers. These products let companies aggregate suppliers' offerings into a single catalog, manage approval processing, and control the transaction process. Businesses today are extending E-procurement beyond controlling the purchase of office supplies and goods for maintenance and repair to reap its benefits in the direct-goods arena.

7. Sol:

Explain four (4) benefits of implementing eCRM technologies.

Many factors play a part in ensuring that the implementation any level of eCRM is successful. One obvious way it could be measured is by the ability for the system to add value to the existing business. There are four suggested implementation steps that affect the viability of a project like this: 1. Developing customer-centric strategies 2. Redesigning workflow management systems 3. Re-engineering work processes 4. Supporting with the right technologies[27]