Assignment

On

“Management Information Technology”Submitted To:

Prof. Jawad Akhtar

Submitted By:

Komal Shahzad

Program:

(MBA--- 3 rd Semester)

Registration #

14

University Of Central Punjab

Q1. You have been asked to develop e-business & e-commerce applications to gain competitive advantage. What reservations might you have about doing so?

Ans. Using e-business and e-commerce applications to gain a competitive advantage is a

very good idea. Doing this I can help my organization grow globally as well as increase the market of our products and services. But if it’s the first time I am using it in the business then I need to be alert and should undergo proper feasibility study of the marketplace because it may backfire. Big markets are not good to experiment at. It takes a huge risk to do so. And also e-commerce and e-business policy may be effective but it might not be the best option for the business I am into. Use of this information technology is profitable for the promotion of those products whose focused customers and users are within the reach of internet and computing facilities. Place and nature of product is very important to consider in order implementing best information technology to implement in order to get the competitive advantage.

As a manager I would have certain reservations about my product’s nature, my customer’s habit and size as well as nature of the market where I am using e-commerce and e-business as a tool for competitive advantage. Because without considering these things, I would not be able to benefit my organization and increase its competitive strength by the use of this sort of information technology. Analyzing all the sources and implementing the best source to gain competitive advantage would be my main concern.

Q2. How could a business use IT to increase switching costs and lock in its customers and suppliers?

Ans. Investment in information technology allows a business to lock its customers and

suppliers as well as other competitors by building valuable and convenient new business relationship with them. Such relationship deters the parties from abandoning a company for its competitor’s product or going for less profitable business arrangements. Focusing on quality of a product and services to customers and suppliers in a firm’s distribution, marketing, sales and service facilities is the main concerns of this aspect.

Q3. How could a business leverage its investment in IT to build strategic IT capabilities that serve as a barrier to entry by new entrants into its markets?

Ans. Information technology helps in making a strong organizational influence in market.

Organization makes investment in information technology as per the financial status and necessity of the organization. The benefit of using information technology should always be higher than cost of deploying it so that organization can make the best out of what is used. Organization can use information technology to ensure strategic capabilities of organization which serves as a barrier for new entrants. By making investment on information technology to improve its operations or promote innovation a firm could discourage or delay other companies from entering a market.

When an organization is doing very well focusing on its customers and making them happy by using information technology to monitor and backup each and every aspects of organization it becomes hard for others who wants to join the same business. When the one playing in the field is very strong with everything managing so smoothly willing to be players find it hard to prepare themselves with all those sorts of things, so there’s very few chance for new entries. Besides, by using information technology organization can develop new products and services that would not be possible without strong IT capability.

Q4. How can Internet technologies help a business form strategic alliances with its customers, suppliers, and others?

Ans. Internet is a very wide network expanded around the world. If an organizations

registers its site in an internet and informs all its concerned bodies about the registration, providing them the instructions to enter into it. All of them can come together at one time for the common discussion from the different parts of the world, together forming strategic alliances by sharing ideas and information’s, accessing and retrieving documents stored in internet. An organization can form separate as well as common alliance with its customers, suppliers and others as per the policy of organization. Such kinds of alliances are very useful to maintain the organization with changing time and scenario.

Q5. How could a business use Internet technologies to form a virtual company or become an agile competitor?

Ans. Virtual Company is an organization that uses information technology to link people,

organizations, ideas and assets. Business organizations develop their virtual companies, and these virtual companies form virtual workgroups and alliances with business partners that are interlinked by internet, intranets and extranets. Through virtual company business organization develops alliances with suppliers, customers, subcontractors, competitors and all the external and internal bodies related with organization, making information sharing more smooth and easy. Business organization can form a virtual company through a strategic alliance of all its major business partners’ facilitating the communication process within the network of internet. Here all the parties get registered in internet and they share their ideas and values to provide a world class solution for customers in order to capture the market opportunity. In today’s growing market it may not always be possible to quickly exploit a new market opportunity by arranging resources to develop the manufacturing and distribution infrastructure, peoples and information technologies so during then virtual company helps an organization to make a quick effort.

Information technology helps an organization to become an agile competitor by supporting the mass customization, offering individualized products while maintaining high volumes of production. Agile companies are so very dependent in internet technologies to integrate and manage business processes, while providing the information processing power to treat masses of customers as individuals.