It becomes a challenge how you integrate your e-systems with your existing system."

size="2" face="Arial">."—Dr

Anitesh Barua Associate Professor,

Information Systems, University of Texas

Having an enviable research experience

in e-business and numerous awards to his credit,Dr Anitesh Barua is the right person for

advice on how to create ‘right culture’ for e-commerce. Barua is an Associate

Professor of Information Systems and a Spurgeon Bell Centennial Fellow at the Graduate

School of Business, University of Texas, US. He is also Associate Director of the Center

for Research on E-commerce at the University. In an interview to DATAQUEST, Barua spoke

about the strategies needed for success in e-commerce. Excerpts:

I think you need to look at

the business aspect more than technology. There are a lot of technologies available. But

the real problem is how do you align your business strategy with it? How do you refocus in

tune with your customer? A lot of companies are realizing now that the new customer is not

really the customer they had in the good old days. Compaq, for instance, has always sold

to distributors and resellers. Now, it realizes that in this new world, it has to sell to

the end-user. It has all the technology and know-how to create fancy web sites with fast

cashing systems. But what they are finding difficult is how to refocus their

distribution strategies so that they can reach the end-user.

• What are the key
  
  deployment issues regarding e-commerce in India?

I think the biggest issue

is to find your business strategy and how are you going to price your product. For

example, if your are going for auctions, then you need to look at specific sites,

otherwise e-auction may turn out to be a bad choice for you.

Again, if you have a plain

vanilla catalog system, it may not work because it assumes that one size fits all and you

are trying to mass customize your offerings. Once you enumerate your business strategy,

you can then see what are the technologies available.

Then, it becomes a

challenge how you integrate your e-systems with your existing



system. I think that is probably the biggest headache any CIO is going through today.

• What are the other
  
  important areas of concern for a country like India?

Well, unlike the US, the

novelty issue is still important in India. How novel is the site—the web site

design—and can you really create that first impression. It is the issue of attracting

attention and building the traffic. The internet sites in the US have already gone through

this and winners have already emerged, but in India it has to be built up. Of course, the

functionality of the site and what you are going to provide is also important.

•   color="#000080" size="2" face="Arial">Do you foresee any major bottlenecks in India? How
  
  important is the security issue?

Yes, I think in India it

will be a huge issue. There is that ‘fear of the unknown,’ which was

also there in the US for the first couple of years. Also, the legal system has to come up.

I think it is going to be a little difficult in the business-to-consumer arena here

because the direct marketing model is very common in the US. People are realizing that

internet is just an extension, a much more efficient extension. In India, we are not so

familiar with this model of direct ordering, so business-to-consumer will face a lot of

stumbling blocks. I am much more optimistic about businesss-to-business commerce.