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Insights
Currently, businesses that do e-commerce face the following dilemmas: How do buyers and sellers find each other on the Web? How are shared business semantics defined? And how do these processes take place outside of one vendor's proprietary grand architecture? The answers lie in leveraging the power of the Internet and technologies such as the Extensible Markup Language (XML) that allow open exchange of information among different enterprises and applications. Many e-commerce application areas stand to benefit from global XML implementation. Transitioning from complete electronic data interchange- (EDI-) based systems to either hybrid EDI/XML systems or purely XML-based systems is beneficial because companies of all sizes can use XML and Internet-based data communications more easily and inexpensively. Marketplace portals will be able to automate intercompany business processes (such as supply-chain management, procurement, logistics, and sell-side/buy-side e-commerce) completely, in addition to connecting buyers and sellers. This level of external integration will reduce operating costs and manual intervention and errors. Enterprise Application Integration aims at finding simpler and more cost-effective ways of making diverse application systems work together while ensuring information fidelity. XML is the perfect integration middleware environment for information exchange between application systems. Enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions vendors are increasingly using XML technology for data exchange and reconciliation. Using XML enables one company to enter and update ERP transactions instantaneously in another company's ERP system--again reducing costs and manual intervention. And content-syndication companies are embracing XML technology to deliver content to customers in order to supplement business marketplace transactions. XML is a vehicle for business communication--the ultimate tool for achieving e-business and e-commerce integration and gaining a competitive advantage in the rapidly changing electronic environment. Author: Lindsay C. Wilson. 11 pages. Index Keywords: Data Management; Electronic Commerce; Information Management; Information Technology; Internet.
As consumers move online in search of health information, the balance of power is shifting in the health-care industry. As a result, many health-care companies are looking to the Internet for new business opportunities. The first consumer-oriented Internet health services primarily offer content, connectivity, and commerce. However, as technology evolves, greater value-added Internet applications in disease management and even lifestyle management will emerge. Other basic health-care functions may join this march to online venues, including claims processing and supply-chain interactions. With each new online service, consumers gain value, and companies build closer relationships with their customers. The author looks at three health-care areas that are most susceptible to change in the electronic-business environment. The pharmaceutical industry, for example, will need to move from online product promotion to relationship building and "solution" branding. Managed-care companies have an opportunity to cut administrative costs in half, and companies along the medical supply chain are announcing online market spaces to streamline procurement processes. Author: Andrew Broderick. 11 pages. Index Keywords: Computer Services; Electronic Commerce; Health Care; Internet; Pharmaceutical Industry.
Business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce is rapidly becoming a major force in world business. The supply chain is the primary target of many B2B applications, and it is here that fulfillment takes a pivotal role, ensuring a seamless flow of information, products, and services. Fulfillment elements take on strategic importance as vendors have to meet requirements for fast, flexible, and reliable deliveries in both domestic and international markets. Unprecedented efficiencies in all parts of fulfillment--from order processing to picking and packing to transportation to final delivery--are possible because of real-time exchange of information among fulfillment parties as well as along the entire supply chain. Improved customer focus emerges from B2B Web portals because fulfillment functions can access real-time data to enhance service levels. Companies formerly oriented toward production and logistics can now use supply-chain information from Web portals to drive their operations, moving toward a customer-focused operation. At the same time, the previously fragmented industry-specific marketplaces, commodity auctions, transportation exchanges, and fulfillment centers are on the way to converge into comprehensive "malls" combining various services. A major challenge still remains with international goods movement. Because of the profusion of individual country export and import requirements, duties, and restrictions, a tremendous burden is on fulfillment. Many carriers and logistics providers are working to overcome these problems and offer a nearly seamless international flow of goods, taking advantage of the new speed that the Internet makes possible. Authors: Martin Schwirn and Claire Starry. 12 pages. Index Keywords: Distribution; Economic Trends; Electronic Commerce; Internet; Logistics.
Although the world's naturally occurring water supplies are relatively fixed, population and economic output continue to grow. Unless consumers become more efficient in their water use, ready access to clean, inexpensive water will become increasingly limited. Many businesses and government agencies are already expressing concerns about a broad range of water-related issues. Examples include the following:
Wireless applications providing access to information from the Internet will hit the market like a tidal wave in the near future. Wireless application protocol (WAP) is an enabling technology for Internet-accessible portable-intelligence devices that has been the subject of tremendous hype and media attention. However, today's WAP is immature and imperfect. Although developers continue to improve and upgrade versions of the WAP protocol, whether future versions of the WAP standard will become the ultimate long-term solution for data and Web access via cellular devices remains a question. Competing technologies (like voice portals, NTT DoCoMo's iMode, Microsoft's multifunctional browser, ScoutWeb, Spyglass's Prism, Oracle's Portal-to-Go, the Handheld Device Markup Language, and the Extensible Markup Language [XML]) with easier interface features and increased functionality are emerging rapidly. WAP may indeed have been the initial step necessary to jump-start wireless industry-development activity (including Internet access for mobile wireless devices), but the longevity of the current standard is questionable. The ultimate goal is to bring full Internet functionality and convenience to the mobile user. Speech portals, XML-based standards, and other developments in progress promise to bring much more user-friendly and robust applications to data-capable mobile wireless devices. Authors: Lindsay C. Wilson and David Benson. 10 pages. Index Keywords: Communications; Electronic Commerce; Internet; Mobile Communications; Telecommunications. News The summaries below describe current activities and programs not included in the B-I-P membership but of potential interest to members. Two New Reports from Media Futures Video entertainment is becoming commonplace on the World Wide Web. Many large and small companies are actively developing entertainment Web-video applications. Today it is restricted to the PC, but Web video promises to slip the bounds of its PC heritage and distribute entertainment programming to television sets. What Web video becomes and how fast it develops will influence several important industries. Most such influence depends on Web video's developing a strong commercial market. The new Media Futures report Web-Video Entertainment explores Web video in terms of when and how such a commercial market might develop and discusses some of its potential short- and long-term effects. Home Networks: A Move to Wireless explores the trend toward increased interconnection of devices within the home and the trend toward creating gateways between home networks and broadband networks. To date, digital technology's greatest impacts outside the workplace have been due to wide-area networks such as mobile telephony, the Internet, and digital satellite broadcasting. The trend toward local-area networks has certainly had an impact on large businesses, but much less impact on small businesses and homes—at least so far. But in an increasingly interconnected world, more and more features of our daily life will be interconnected, including everyday objects in the home. The increase in digital traffic within homes will create opportunities and in some cases threats to manufacturers, service providers, and studios. Home networks will constitute new delivery destinations for content providers, and they will make data services more fun, more attractive, and far easier to use. And once a home network is in place, manufacturers will find opportunities to sell additional follow-on products that increase the utility of the home network. For more information about Media Futures, visit our Web site: http://www.sric-bi.com; telephone: |
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