Electronic Commerce (E-

commerce)
Course Content
 Week 1:- Introduction to E-commerce, e-business, unique features of e-commerce

 Week 2:- Major types and trends of e-commerce

 Week 3: Eight key elements of e-commerce business model

 Week 4:- Major Business-to-consumer (B2C) business model

 Week 5:- Major Business-to-business (B2B) business model

 Week 6:- How e-commerce changes businesses

 Week 7:- Technological building blocks underlying e-commerce

 Week 8:- Revision Mid Term Exam

 Electronic Commerce (E-
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 Week 9:- Raising capital, essential e-commerce processes

 Week 10:- E-commerce success factors

 Week 11:- Ethical, social and political issues in e-commerce

 Week 12:- Developing a web store Submission of Report

 Week 13:- Report Presentation

 Week 14:- Report Presentation

 Week 15:- Revision

Final Term Exam

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• Recommended Reading

• E-commerce 2021–2022 business. technology. society- Pearson

Education Limited (2022) – by Kenneth C. Laudon and Carol
Guercio Traver – 17th Edition

• Management Information Systems by O’Brien, Marakas and Behl–

10th Edition –McGraw Hill – Published 2013
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Division of Marks – Total marks: 100
1. Sessional: 20 Marks – group report
a. Report – 2000 words +/- 10%
b. Topic: “E-commerce in the time of distress – Impact of COVID-19 on e-commerce”
c. Group based and submission is in week 12
d. Presentations – week 13 and week 14 *Do not
forget to include
2. Mid Term: 30 Marks local e-commerce
i. 15 MCQs (1 x15) ii. 3 short questions (3x3=09)
iii. 1 descriptive question (1x6=06)

3. Final Term: 50 Marks

i. 20 MCQs (20x1=20) ii. 2 short questions (2x5=10)
iii. 2 descriptive questions (2x10=20)
 Electronic Commerce (E-
commerce)
Topics for this week
1. Introduction to E-commerce
2. Difference between e-commerce and e-business
3. Understanding e-commerce: organizing themes (i.e. technology, business, society)
4. Unique features of e-commerce technology
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E-commerce
“the use of the Internet, the Web, and mobile apps and browsers
running on mobile devices to transact business. More formally, digitally enabled
commercial transactions between and among organizations and individuals.”
(Laudon and Traver, 2022, p45)

Digitally enabled transactions include all transactions mediated by digital technology. For the most
part, this means transactions that occur over the Internet, the Web, and/or via mobile devices.
Commercial transactions involve the exchange of value(e.g., money) across organizational or
individual boundaries in return for products and services. Exchange of value is important for
understanding the limits of e-commerce. Without an exchange of value, no commerce occurs.

e-commerce and digital commerce to be synonymous.

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E-commerce
Never existed before 1994
The early years of e-commerce, during the late 1990s, were a period of business vision,
inspiration, and experimentation.
After the dot-com bubble burst in 2000, many people were quick to write off e-commerce.
But they were wrong. The people who succeeded, understood the technology as an
Enabler
Between 2002–2007, retail e-commerce grew at more than 25% per year.
In 2020, just over 25 years later, around 2.3 billion consumers spent about over $5 trillion,
and businesses almost $27 trillion, purchasing goods and services via a desktop computer
or mobile device.
Analysts estimate that by 2023, consumers worldwide will be spending around $7 trillion
and businesses over $32 trillion in digital transactions.
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E-business
“the digital enabling of transactions and processes within a firm, involving
information systems under the control of the firm.” (Laudon and Traver, 2022, p45)

a company’s online inventory control mechanisms are a

component of e-business, but such internal processes do not
directly generate revenue for the firm from outside businesses
or consumers, as e-commerce, by definition, does.
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Understanding e-commerce: organizing themes
Technology
To understand e-commerce, you need a basic understanding of the information technologies upon
which it is built, including the Internet, the Web, and mobile platform, and a host of
complementary technologies—cloud computing, desktop computers, smartphones, tablet
computers, local area networks, client/server computing, packet-switched communications,
protocols such as TCP/IP, web servers, HTML, and relational and non-relational databases, among
others.
Business
While technology provides the infrastructure, it is the business applications—the potential for
extraordinary returns on investment—that create the interest and excitement in e-commerce.
Therefore, you also need to understand some key business concepts such as electronic markets,
information goods, business models, firm and industry value chains, industry structure, and
consumer behavior in digital markets.
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Understanding e-commerce: organizing themes
Society
Understanding the pressures that global e-commerce places on contemporary society is critical to
being successful in the e-commerce marketplace. The primary societal issues are intellectual
property, individual privacy, and public policy.
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Academic disciplines concerned with e-commerce
There are two primary approaches to e-commerce: technical and behavioral. Each of
these approaches is represented by several academic disciplines.

On the technical side, this includes computer science (e.g. hardware, software,
encryption etc.), operations management (mathematical models of business processes
and optimize these processes), and information systems (data mining, business
intelligence etc.)

On the behavioral side, it includes information systems (impact of e-commerce on

society) as well as economics (pricing of digital goods etc.), finance and accounting (e-
commerce firm valuation and accounting practices), management (entrepreneurial
behavior etc.), and marketing (brand development, awareness, ability of e-commerce
technology to segment and target consumer groups), sociologists and psychologists
(general population studies on usage of internet etc.)
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Eight unique features of e-commerce technology
 Electronic Commerce (E-
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Eight unique features of e-commerce technology
Ubiquity—available just about everywhere, at all times, making it possible to shop from
your desktop, at home, at work, or even from your car.

Global reach—permits commercial transactions to cross cultural and national boundaries

far more conveniently and cost-effectively than is true in traditional commerce.

Universal standards—shared by all nations around the world, in contrast to most

traditional commerce technologies, which differ from one nation to the next.

Richness—enables an online merchant to deliver marketing messages in a way not possible

with traditional commerce technologies.

Interactivity—allows for two-way communication between merchant and consumer and

enables the merchant to engage a consumer in ways similar to a face-to-face experience,
but on a much more massive, global scale.
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Eight unique features of e-commerce technology
Information density—is the total amount and quality of information available to all market
participants. The Internet reduces information collection, storage, processing, and
communication costs while increasing the currency, accuracy, and timeliness of
information.

Personalization and customization—the increase in information density allows merchants

to target their marketing messages to specific individuals and results in a level of
personalization and customization unthinkable with previously existing commerce
technologies.

Social technology—provides a many-to-many model of mass communications. Millions of

users are able to generate content consumed by millions of other users. The result is the
formation of social networks on a wide scale and the aggregation of large audiences on
social network platforms.
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