e-business uses the global reach of the Internet to connect customers, vendors, suppliers and employees together, and the information they need, to do a better job. It represents a secure, reliable, scalable and manageable framework that builds on existing technology investments to prepare for the future. It is about Web-enabling core business processes to improve customer service, reduce product cycle time, get better results from limited resources and sell products electronically.

Why you need to be ready for e-business

The emerging Digital Economy, with its intense competition and global scope, requires rapid, agile responsiveness to constantly changing market opportunities and challenges. Companies planning to survive and prosper in this new environment need to have the latest information technology tools in place now and learn how to use them. Examples are given below.

Start doing e-commerce

e-commerce means financial transactions conducted over the Internet, either business to consumer or business to business. Now is the time to open this additional sales channel for products and services. The technology exists today for safe, secure Internet commerce. Companies of any size can thereby extend their market reach. Those that also automate their supply chain are poised to reap even greater benefits.

Web-based e-commerce provides sophisticated market intelligence by tracking customer visits, sales, purchase trends and product preferences, all at the individual level. It allows personalized, one-on-one direct marketing. 

Improve team collaboration and enterprise agility

Doing business requires employees, vendors, suppliers and partners to work together. Collaboration software, often called groupware, can improve this interaction, enabling better information flow, coordination, and responsiveness within a workgroup, within the enterprise as a whole, and with selected players outside. Key processes will benefit: project lifetime planning, scheduling and tracking, and the interactive involvement of suppliers, contractors, and customers. For example, the company supply chain can be automated, so customer orders cause inventory to be restocked to a desired level from suppliers.

Improve customer service with the Web

Many companies have Web sites, but to date these have largely been static, brochure type presentations of company information. While such first generation Web publishing has helped disseminate information within the company and to customers, much more is possible. For example, moving customer service processes to the Web makes it easier to do business with a company. Customers can serve themselves in such areas as placing and tracking orders and product support. This alternative to the telephone, particularly for more routine matters, will help free up the service logjam and focus scarce human resources on the remaining issues.

Internet enable legacy software and systems to preserve investments

To support collaboration and information exchange at a distance, as well as within the enterprise, existing software needs to be enabled to send and receive information over the Internet and the Intranet.  Legacy systems, containing valuable business logic and data, can be preserved and rejuvenated with a gateway allowing secure access from outside.

Re-use and share data more effectively

Using an automated document management system, information now scattered all over a company, in catalogs, marketing literature, product specifications, manuals, etc. and typically in many incompatible formats and versions, can be brought together in a central repository as components. These parts can be readily managed and maintained, then reassembled and rendered as needed for a particular purpose (e.g. product manual, marketing brochure) and delivery medium (e.g. Web, paper, CD-ROM). Such an object-oriented, enterprise-wide, automated document management system, based on SGML or XML standards, with built in access, use and version control, can result in great improvements in information quality, time to market and production costs. 

Our services

Boston Engineering Services offers Internet consulting services to help companies establish a business presence on the Internet (e-business) or update their existing presence to benefit from these new developments. The technologies we offer to implement e-business solutions include software packages as well as customized programming to integrate systems. For example: IBM^® Websphere, DB2, Net.Commerce, Lotus^® Notes/Domino, Java^TM, C++, XML. We first work closely with the customer to define the business objectives to be met and then recommend tools for the solution.

We differ from other vendors in offering custom solutions and personal service, with enterprise-grade technologies, battle tested by Fortune 500 companies, but at affordable prices. 

Act now

Early adopters still have a limited window of opportunity to establish a competitive advantage. Call today to schedule a free initial consultation, and learn how to leverage these technologies to successfully move your enterprise into the new business world of the 21st century.

Contact information

Boston Engineering Services, G. E. Tucker, Ph.D., President
(800) 739-2904 (voice); (781) 240-5615 (FAX)
email: gtucker@bostoneng.com

Visit our online e-business bookstore

For more background information on e-business, consult our bookstore's recommended reading list.

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