Role of E-Technologies in Changing Business Operations and Associated Threats and Risks

E-Business Fundamentals and Systems

Role of E-Technologies in changing business operations and how suppliers
overcome associated threats and risks
In today’s competitive business world, organisations rely on modern technologies to
perform their business operations. Effective use of the latest technologies resulted in
increasing efficiency at the workplace and improving overall performance of the
corporations. With the popularity of the internet and online-based services, the role of e-
technologies has grown substantially in modern corporations. E-technology is a term which
is referred to a broad range of technologies including the internet and related information
technologies (Rosa et al., 2015). In the past few years, organisations rely on e-technologies
to perform their business operations which provide them a competitive advantage in the
industry. Organisations use technologies such as cloud computing, big data, e-commerce,
and others to provide effective products and services to their customers and improve the
efficiency of their operations. However, while using these technologies, there are a number
of risks and threats faced by suppliers of these technologies which creates challenges for
corporations (Sanya, 2013). These risks resulted in adversely affecting the profitability of
organisations, thus, suppliers are required to take appropriate measure to improve the
security of their services. This essay will focus on evaluating the role of e-technologies in
changing business operations of modern organisations. Furthermore, various threats and
risks faced by suppliers of such technologies and how they overcome these challenges will
be discussed in the essay.
The internet is a major source which has contributed to increasing the popularity and use of
e-technologies in modern organisations. Use of these technologies assists corporations in
increasing the efficiency of their business operations which reduces their costs while
improving the quality of their operations. One of the most popular e-technologies which are
used by companies in the cloud computing. It is a part of information technology (IT) which
enables organisations to access their data ubiquitously. The Cloud Service Providers (CSPs)
enables suppliers to deliver various computing service to organisations such as server,
storage, networking, analytics, software, databases and more through the internet
(Christauskas and Miseviciene, 2012). It is defined as the practice of remote servers which
are hosted on the internet rather than a local server to provide services such as storing,
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managing and processing data. Organisations such as Netflix has gained a competitive
advantage in the industry by relying on e-technologies such as cloud computing. Netflix
operates in the entertainment industry, and it provides the service of video on demand to
its customers across the globe. Due to the ubiquitous nature of cloud computing, Netflix is
able to dominate the online video service market and easily provide its services across the
globe which would have not possible otherwise (Berman et al., 2012). It has changed the
business operations of modern organisations because they rely on online service delivery
rather than the offline delivery. It enables them to expand their customer base and reach a
wider audience globally which otherwise would not have been possible.
Big data is another e-technology which has gained popularity among large organisations
which use it to understand the behaviour of customers and form marketing strategies
accordingly. It is referred to an extremely large set of data sets which are collected by
corporations to analyse which assist in revealing patterns, associations, trends and
behaviour of human interactions especially. Some of the world’s biggest enterprises such as
Amazon, Netflix, General Electric and American Express use the big data technology to
reveal trends and association in their customers’ behaviour (Provost and Fawcett, 2013). For
example, Netflix uses big data to gain insight into its viewers watching behaviour which
enables it to make adjustments to its algorithms. By using big data technology, the company
evaluates what its viewers like to watch and what they would like to watch in the future
which assist it in providing them authentic recommendations which increase its viewership.
On the other hand, Amazon uses big data to analyse the buying pattern of its customers. It
enables the company to increase proximity between vendors and customers which result in
reducing its distribution costs. Furthermore, the corporation is able to deliver services such
as one-day delivery or same-day delivery based on using big data technology, whereas,
previously people have to wait 5-6 or more days to deliver their package (McAfee et al.,
2012). It shows how e-technologies are enabled organisations to improve their products and
services while at the same time reaching a broader audience due to improved efficiency in
their operations.
Another popular e-technology which has gained substantial popularity is e-commerce or
online shopping. Amazon is the world’s largest e-commerce service provider which provides
its services to customers across the globe. The company has gained substantial success and
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