English study

The Development Foreground of Electronic Commerce I. The definition of Electronic Commerce What is the Electronic Commerce? As the definition of KalaKata and Whinston, they definite it forms four perspectives----business process, communication, service and on-line. In a word, it is a kind of commerce that is sharing business information, maintaining business relationship, and conducting business. Transaction by means of telecommunication network, since the ancient form of traditional commerce was bartering, which eventually gave way to the use of currency as the principal way of making transaction. Electronic Commerce is not just having a Web Side but having supporting information and organization infrastructure and system. Who could ever think about that they could accessible form every point of planet without putting a foot out of door hundreds years ago? Now as the use of the internet expands, this miracle has emerges as an appliance of everyday life, once reserving scientific and academic uses. Student across the world can share the variety of valuable date through World Wide Web; Doctors can utilize teller medicine to meet the need of patients; Citizens can express themselves freely, personally, and politically. Since the internet, which is the best invention for human race since the printing press and the telephone, has been reshaping our life and communities gradually, the electronic commerce which is the by product also finds its position through the internet. II. The development of Electronic Commerce These years electronic commerce has also gradually appeared in the notion of citizens. Its application was started in the early 1970s with the invention of Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT) which was designed to transfer a certain amount of money form 1 one account to another. From traditional commerce to Electronic commerce, there is the disappearing role of an intermediary, such as a dealer or a broker. Though there is the new role of intermediation, such as e-malls, directory and search engine services. These new intermediaries replace the traditional intermediary layers. Some people argued that the E-commerce may someday take the place of the traditional commerce. This viewpoint can be easily overturned by some reasons, for there are many business processes well-suited to traditional but not the E-commerce such as purchase of clothing, perishable food product small denomination transaction. Most of the girls and women can not avoid the joyfulness of the shopping especially the purchasing of the clothes from this shop to that shop among the huge crowd of people. Then it’s more convenient and practical to purchase perishable food. On the other hand, we could not neglect the power of the electronic commerce on some area of business process-on-line delivery of software, advertising and promotion of travel service, purchase of books and CDs. The famous cyber—bookstore Amazon which is the largest cyber—bookstore with 50 percent of the cyber book market share is a great example. As the development of the technology, the characters of E-commerce will enhance day by day. It could gradually take the largest range in business process area, although it could not overthrow the traditional commerce completely. 2.1 Some business process well-suited to traditional also needs to develop the E-commerce Nobody thinks real shops are finished, especially those operating in niche markets. Many bricks-and-mortar bookshops still make a good living, as do flea markets. But many record shops and travel agents could be in for a tougher time. Erik Blachford, the head of IAC’s travel side and boss of Expedia, the biggest internet travel agent, thinks online travel bookings in America could quickly move from 20% of the market to more than half. Mr. Bezos reckons online retailers might capture 10-15% of retail sales over the next decade. That would represent a massive shift in spending. How will traditional shops respond? Michael Dell, the founder of Dell, which leads the personal-computer market by selling direct to the customer, has long thought many shops will turn into showrooms. There are already signs of change on the high street. The latest Apple and Sony stores are designed to display products, in the full expectation that many people will buy online. To some extent, the online and offline worlds may merge. Multi-channel selling could involve a combination of traditional shops, a printed catalogue, a home-shopping channel on TV, a phone-in order service and an e-commerce-enabled website. But often it is likely to be the website where customers will be encouraged to place their orders. 2.2Some others suited to E-commerce Half of the 60m consumers in Europe who have an internet connection bought products offline after having investigated prices and details online, according to a study by Forrester, a research consultancy. Different countries have different habits. In Italy and Spain, for instance, people are twice as likely to buy offline as online after researching on the internet. But in Britain and Germany, the two most developed internet markets, the numbers are evenly split. Forrester says that people begin to shop online for simple, predictable products, such as DVDs, and then graduate to more complex items. Used-car sales are now one of the biggest online growth areas in America. People seem to enjoy shopping on the internet, if high customer-satisfaction scores are any guide. Websites are doing ever more and cleverer things to serve and entertain their customers, and seem set to take a much bigger share of people’s overall spending in the future. 2.3E-commerce taking larger ranges of area gradually It is not only price transparency that makes internet consumers so powerful; it is also the way the net makes it easy for them to be fickle. If they do not like a website, they swiftly move on. “The web is the most selfish environment in the world,” says Daniel Rosensweig, chief operating officer of Yahoo! “People want to use the internet whenever they want, how they want and for whatever they want.” Yahoo! is not alone in defining its strategy as working out what its customers (260m unique users every month) are looking for, and then trying to give it to them. The first thing they want is to become better informed about products and prices. “We operate our business on that belief,” says Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s chief executive. Amazon became famous for books, but long ago branched out into selling lots of other things too; among its latest ventures are health products, jewellery and gourmet food. Apart from cheap and bulky items such as garden rakes, Mr. Bezos thinks he can sell most things. And so do the millions of people who use eBay. III. The advantages of the E-commerce One of the biggest commercial advantages of the internet is a lowering of transaction costs, which usually translates directly into lower prices for the consumer. So, if the lowest prices can be found on the internet and people like the service they get, why would they buy anywhere else? One reason may be convenience; another, concern about fraud, which poses the biggest threat to online trade. But as long as the internet continues to deliver price and product information quickly, cheaply and securely, e-commerce will continue to grow. Increasingly, companies will have to assume that customers will know exactly where to look for the best buy. This market has the potential to become as perfect as it gets. 3.1The advantage for company For company, it can increase profit and sales and decrease cost. Advertising can reach potential customs in every country in the world through internet. A virtual community is formed on which company can communicate with customs conveniently. Paper-based buying and selling often requires large clerical staffs. Envelopes need to be prepared, and errors need to be corrected. Organizations can achieve major clerical staff reduction by automating billing and bill payment. Significant staff savings can also be achieved in many other ways through the use of electronic methods. For example, sales and support staff can be reduced when customers are able to obtain information online rather than via telephone inquiries. Staff for printing and mailing catalogues can also be eliminated when paper catalogues are converted to online versions. Orders entered online rather than via a telephone conversation require less staff time while generating fewer errors. 3.2The advantage for customers Electronic commerce often results in much closer relationships among companies and their customers and suppliers. For example, Boeing gave its customers direct access to its own computers, helping them to do their job better and causing those customers to want to remain with Boeing Mechanics using the Boeing system are also able to see not only the inventory of Boeing warehouses but also the inventory of Boeing of parts suppliers. In this way the mechanic is able to locate the closest source for a critical part. Thus, both customer and supplier are better served. For buyers, E-commerce increase purchasing opportunities, speed accuracy of information and choices and reduce cost. Electronic payment of tax refunds public retirement and welfare support costs less to issue. Electronic payment is more secure and faster and easier to control than checks. It reduces commutes-cost and traffic jams. 3.3 E-Commerce easy for use and improved Control many customers are turning to online financial markets trading because they have more control over their own funds as well as, because these systems are so easy to use compared with placing telephone orders. Many other firms now support stock, bond, futures, and options trading with direct dial-in to their computers, offering deep discounts for those who traders prefer electronic trading because orders can be entered at any time, 24 hours a day, with confirmations arriving almost immediately. Investors can also check their account status at any time and do not have to wait for monthly statements. 3.4. E-Commerce has a perfect market E-commerce is coming of age, says Paul Markillie, but not in the way predicted in the bubble years. When the technology bubble burst in 2000, the crazy valuations for online companies vanished with it, and many businesses folded. The survivors plugged on as best they could, encouraged by the growing number of internet users. Now valuations are rising again and some of the dotcoms are making real profits, but the business world has become much more cautious about the internet’s potential. The funny thing is that the wild predictions made at the height of the boom—namely, that vast chunks of the world economy would move into cyberspace—are, in one way or another, coming true. The raw numbers tell only part of the story. According to America’s Department of Commerce, online retail sales in the world’s biggest market last year rose by 26%, to $55 billion. That sounds a lot of money, but it amounts to only 1.6% of total retail sales. The vast majority of people still buy most things in the good old “bricks-and-mortar” world. But the commerce department’s figures deal with only part of the retail industry. For instance, they exclude online travel services, one of the most successful and fastest-growing sectors of e-commerce. Inter Active Corp (IAC), the owner of expedia.com and hotels.com, alone sold $10 billion-worth of travel last year—and it has plenty of competition, not least from airlines, hotels and car-rental companies, all of which increasingly sell online. Nor do the figures take in things like financial services, ticket-sales agencies, pornography (a $2 billion business in America last year, according to Adult Video News, a trade magazine), online dating and a host of other activities, from tracing ancestors to gambling (worth perhaps $6 billion worldwide). They also leave out purchases in grey markets, such as the online pharmacies that are thought to be responsible for a good proportion of the $700m that Americans spent last year on buying cut-price prescription drugs from across the border in Canada. A nd there is more. The commerce department’s figures include the fees earned by internet auction sites, but not the value of goods that are sold: an astonishing $24 billion-worth of trade was done last year on eBay, the biggest online auctioneer. Nor, by definition, do they include the billions of dollars-worth of goods bought and sold by businesses connecting to each other over the internet. Some of these B2 B services are proprietary; for example, Wal-Mart tells its suppliers that they must use its own system if they want to be part of its annual turnover of $250 billion. So e-commerce is already very big, and it is going to get much bigger. But the actual value of transactions currently concluded online is dwarfed by the extraordinary influence the internet is exerting over purchases carried out in the offline world. That influence is becoming an integral part of e-commerce. To start with, the internet is profoundly changing consumer behavior. One in five customers walking into a Sears department store in America to buy an electrical appliance will have researched their purchase online—and most will know down to a dime what they intend to pay. More surprisingly, three out of four Americans start shopping for new cars online, even though most end up buying them from traditional dealers. The difference is that these customers come to the showroom armed with information about the car and the best available deals. Sometimes they even have computer print-outs identifying the particular vehicle from the dealer’s stock that they want to buy. IV. Important problem facing the future of electronic commerce As the new commerce emerges for a short time, there is no doubt that the electronic commerce is still in its infancy, although it has great potential. It's reported that the most important problem facing the future of electronic commerce are security and connection time. The security problem is one that the customs are concerned mostly since these are so many threats in the internet nowadays. The numbers of the secure transaction sites is still low. This may well be a barrier to the visitor considering buying products for services over the internet. Connection time is also a problem that should be facing. It is believed that unless the connection time become faster, the web problem will put off many users. The payment is the next problem, although electronic payments schemes such as E-check and digital cash are being introduced. Many companies allow customers to order via E-mail but payment is still carried out using conventional methods. The electronic commerce can just expected to increase as soon as these immature aspects improved. V. Conclusion Electronic Commerce as a new and popular role emerges through the internet and in citizen’s notion.It has many advantages that the tradition commerce that don’t has, more convenient, quickly, cost saving etc. It changes the customs’ consumption way. It reshapes the commerce organization dramatically. Electronic commerce is a new power that impact people’s life. But because it is new, it has many disadvantages and immaturity. It needs the deeper development with newer and stronger technology to improve the security and payment system. The society should leave enough space to improve and regulate it, but not restricting and stopping it. We believe that Electronic commerce will be a brilliant commerce in the future. The citizens will accept it confidently but not confusingly. Reference: 1.Zhao Jin,“The Characteristics and Attributes of New Chinese Entrepreneurs and Their Emerging Enterprises”The Journal of Business Forum, V ol. 24, Nos. 3,4, Page 31-38, 2001. 2.Ken Downie, New Products & Services, Controller Magazine January, 1998 3.楚国立, 谢芳, 电子商务飓风, 北方经济, 1999, (4)