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Integrating e-Business
Business processes must not only incorporate timely company information –
for improved customer relationship management, supply chain management, and
beyond, they must also be kept up-to-date with fast-changing business needs.
E-business facilitating these processes is the way most business soon will
be transacted. Whether or not you ever plan to sell products or services
over the Web, your most important customer or supplier may one day insist
upon using Web for all transaction.
The fastest growing companies are moving aggressively to bring e-business
into all their operations. They align their systems with their fast-changing
business priorities and use these systems strategically, for growth. In
addition, successful businesses are employing information technology to
gather and interpret data about their ultimate customers, including
demographics, trends, and buying behavior.
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e-Business
Benefits of e-Business
The Tree of Online Success
Planning for e-Business
ROI
IT-Business Alignment
10 Tips
Artificial Intelligence
(AI)
Experimenting with AI as a
Writer
Danger of Over-delegating
to AI
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Virtual Integration vs. Vertical
Integration
Vertical integration performs,
virtual integration innovates.
In the new world of virtual
integration, no matter who signs
the check, all the people are
working together for a common
cause.
Vertical integration is history,
the future will be about virtual
organizations operating within
virtual
supply chains.
Virtual integration, as opposed
to traditional vertical
"contractor-subcontractor"
integration, represents the
decomposition of the traditional
company. Virtual integration is
characterized by culturally
different value-added
relationships between
manufacturers and suppliers.
The
design, system development,
product sourcing, logistics, and
even final assembly can all be
outsourced to supply chain
partners. Increasingly the goal
is to replace physical assets
with information in such a way
that every member of this
extended supply chain benefits.
This forces the move from an
environment of ‘hard wired
integration’, where
relationships are arms-length
and adversarial, even across
functional boundaries within the
organization, to an environment
based on ‘negotiated sourcing’,
where non-core activities are
outsourced and collaborative
partnerships are the norm,
writes Jeremy Hammant in the
article "From vertical
integration to virtual
integration".
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