E-commerce development risk evaluation using MCDM techniques

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016. Electronic commerce (EC) development takes place in a complex and dynamic environment that includes high levels of risk and uncertainty. This paper proposes a new method for assessing the risks associated with EC development using multi-criteria decision-making techniques A model based on the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and the technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) is proposed to assist EC project managers and decision makers in formalizing the types of thinking that are required in assessing the current risk environment of their EC development in a more systematic manner than previously. The solution includes the use of AHP for analyzing the problem structure and determining the weights of risk factors. The TOPSIS technique helps to obtain a final ranking among projects, and the results of an evaluation show the usefulness performance of the method

Global Value Chains: Pengaruh Shopee terhadap Ekspansi Usaha Mikro Kecil Menengah Digital di Asia Tenggara

Teknologi membantu pekerjaan manusia terasa lebih ringan. Salah satu teknologi yang diciptakan adalah online shopping, dan e-commerce hadir sebagai wadah aktivitas jual-beli secara online tersebut. Salah satu wadah e-commerce yang sudah populer dikenal banyak orang adalah Shopee. Shopee juga menyediakan kesempatan bagi masyarakat yang ingin memulai bisnis secara online. Penelitian yang akan dilakukan dapat dilihat dari perusahaan e-commerce ternama, Shopee di kawasan Asia Tenggara. Ia akan dianalisis menggunakan konsep global value chain dicetuskan oleh Michael Porter. Metode penelitian yang digunakan adalah Scientific Revolution oleh Morton Kaplan yang di analisis secara kualitatif. Metode tersebut mengumpulkan beberapa bagian dari kehidupan sosial dan akan menghasilkan kesatuan yang besar, melihat dari data nyata yang akan membuktikan prediksi penelitian. Melalui data-data awal yang telah ditemukan dan dianalisis, Shopee mempunyai potensi yang besar untuk memperluas kawasan bisnisnya, bukan hanya di Asia Tenggara saja. Hal tersebut dilihat dari perkembangan ketertarikan masyarakat terhadap Shopee dari tahun ke tahun. Kata kunci: Shopee, Teknologi, E-commerce, Asia Tenggara/ Technology helps people's work feel lighter. One of the technologies that have been created is online shopping, and e-commerce comes as a forum for online buying and selling activities. One of the e-commerce containers that is well known to many people is Shopee. Shopee also provides opportunities for people who want to start a business online. The research that will be done can be seen from a well-known e-commerce company, Shopee in Southeast Asia. It will be analyzed using the global value chain concept coined by Michael Porter. The research method used is Scientific Revolution by Morton Kaplan which is analyzed qualitatively. The method collects several parts of social life and will generate great unity, looking at real data that will prove the predictions of research. Through the initial data that has been found and analyzed, Shopee has great potential to expand its business district, not just in Southeast Asia. This is seen from the development of public interest in Shopee, year after year. Keywords : Shopee, Technology, E-commerce, Southeast Asi

Analysing the Diffusion of a Mobile Service Supporting the E-grocery Supply Chain

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to propose a systemic methodology to assess the potential of and facilitate policies for the diffusion of a smartphone based service enabling supply chain (SC) operations in the e-grocery sector. Design/methodology/approach – A System Dynamics (SD) model combining the Bass paradigm for innovation diffusion and an inventory management framework is developed. Semi-structured interviews are conducted to understand the industry business processes; a simple SD model is designed to capture the most important variables together with the relationships among them; a detailed SD model is calibrated and simulation outcomes are analysed. Findings – The efficiency and reliability of the service drive its diffusion among producers and consumers, who in turn persuade retailers to adopt. The assessment methodology can be part of feasibility studies and marketing investigations in order to understand the impact of e-commerce tools on SC processes. Research limitations/implications – This contribution stresses the need to analyse how mobile information technologies may benefit all the business processes of the e-grocery SC, and not just one single process or stakeholder. Practical implications – The approach offers a roadmap to identify the factors influencing the diffusion of mobile e-grocery services as well as the associated impacts on SC processes. Originality/value – The work contributes to overcoming the lack of approaches studying the diffusion of e-grocery by taking into account all the relevant aspects and stakeholders involved and not only the consumer perspective

THE INVESTIGATION OF THE FACTORS ASSOCIATING CONSUMERS’ TRUST IN E-COMMERCE ADOPTION

The success of electronic commerce significantly depends on providing security and privacy for its consumers’ sensitive personal information. Consumers’ lack of acceptance in electronic commerce adoption today is not merely due to the concerns on security and privacy of their personal information, but also lack of trust and reliability of web vendors. Consumers’ trust in online transactions is crucial for the continuous growth and development of electronic commerce. Since Business to Consumer (B2C) e-commerce requires the consumers to engage the technologies, the consumers face a variety of security risks. This study addressed the role of security, privacy and risk perceptions of consumers to shop online in order to establish a consensus among them. The findings provided reliability, factors analysis for the research variables and for each of the study’s research constructs, correlations as well as regression analyses for both non-online purchasers’ and online purchasers’ perspectives, and structural equation modeling (SEM) for overall model fit. The overall model was tested by AMOS 18.0 and the hypothesis, assumptions for SEM and descriptive statistics were analyzed by SPSS 12.0. The empirical results of the first study indicated that there were poor correlations existed between consumers’ perceived security and consumers’ trust as well as between consumers’ perceived privacy and consumers’ trust regarding e-commerce transactions. However, the construct of perceived privacy manifested itself primarily through perceived security and trustworthiness of web vendors. While trustworthiness of web vendors was a critical factor in explaining consumers’ trust to adopt ecommerce, it was important to pay attention to the consumers’ risk concerns on ecommerce transactions. It was found that economic incentives and institutional trust had no impact on consumers’ perceived risk. Findings from the second study indicated that perceived privacy was still to be the slight concern for consumers’ trust in e-commerce transactions, though poor vi i relationships or associations existed between perceived security and consumers’ trust, between trustworthiness of web vendors and consumers’ trust, and between perceived risk and consumers’ trust. The findings also showed that the construct of perceived privacy manifested itself primarily through perceived security and trustworthiness of web vendors. It was found that though economic incentives influenced a consumers’ perceived risk in online transactions, institutional trust had no impact on consumers’ perceived risk. Overall findings suggested that consumers’ perceived risk influenced their trust in e-commerce transactions, while the construct of perceived privacy manifested itself primarily through perceived security as well as trustworthiness of web vendors. In addition, though economic incentives had no impact on consumers’ perceived risk, institutional trust influenced a consumers’ perceived risk in online transactions. The findings also suggested that economic incentives and institutional trust had relationships or associations with consumers’ perceived privacy. The findings from this research showed that consumers’ perceived security and perceived privacy were not mainly concerned to their trust in e-commerce transactions though consumers’ perceived security and perceived privacy might slightly influence on the trustworthiness of web vendors in dealing with online store sites abroad. Furthermore, consumers’ perceptions on the trustworthiness of web vendors were also related to their perceived risks and the concern about privacy was also addressed to perceived risks. Index terms: Perceived security; perceived privacy; perceived risk; trust; consumers’ behaviour; SE

Analysis of Decision Support Systems of Industrial Relevance: Application Potential of Fuzzy and Grey Set Theories

The present work articulates few case empirical studies on decision making in industrial context. Development of variety of Decision Support System (DSS) under uncertainty and vague information is attempted herein. The study emphases on five important decision making domains where effective decision making may surely enhance overall performance of the organization. The focused territories of this work are i) robot selection, ii) g-resilient supplier selection, iii) third party logistics (3PL) service provider selection, iv) assessment of supply chain’s g-resilient index and v) risk assessment in e-commerce exercises. Firstly, decision support systems in relation to robot selection are conceptualized through adaptation to fuzzy set theory in integration with TODIM and PROMETHEE approach, Grey set theory is also found useful in this regard; and is combined with TODIM approach to identify the best robot alternative. In this work, an attempt is also made to tackle subjective (qualitative) and objective (quantitative) evaluation information simultaneously, towards effective decision making. Supplier selection is a key strategic concern for the large-scale organizations. In view of this, a novel decision support framework is proposed to address g-resilient (green and resilient) supplier selection issues. Green capability of suppliers’ ensures the pollution free operation; while, resiliency deals with unexpected system disruptions. A comparative analysis of the results is also carried out by applying well-known decision making approaches like Fuzzy- TOPSIS and Fuzzy-VIKOR. In relation to 3PL service provider selection, this dissertation proposes a novel ‘Dominance- Based’ model in combination with grey set theory to deal with 3PL provider selection, considering linguistic preferences of the Decision-Makers (DMs). An empirical case study is articulated to demonstrate application potential of the proposed model. The results, obtained thereof, have been compared to that of grey-TOPSIS approach. Another part of this dissertation is to provide an integrated framework in order to assess gresilient (ecosilient) performance of the supply chain of a case automotive company. The overall g-resilient supply chain performance is determined by computing a unique ecosilient (g-resilient) index. The concepts of Fuzzy Performance Importance Index (FPII) along with Degree of Similarity (DOS) (obtained from fuzzy set theory) are applied to rank different gresilient criteria in accordance to their current status of performance. The study is further extended to analyze, and thereby, to mitigate various risk factors (risk sources) involved in e-commerce exercises. A total forty eight major e-commerce risks are recognized and evaluated in a decision making perspective by utilizing the knowledge acquired from the fuzzy set theory. Risk is evaluated as a product of two risk quantifying parameters viz. (i) Likelihood of occurrence and, (ii) Impact. Aforesaid two risk quantifying parameters are assessed in a subjective manner (linguistic human judgment), rather than exploring probabilistic approach of risk analysis. The ‘crisp risk extent’ corresponding to various risk factors are figured out through the proposed fuzzy risk analysis approach. The risk factor possessing high ‘crisp risk extent’ score is said be more critical for the current problem context (toward e-commerce success). Risks are now categorized into different levels of severity (adverse consequences) (i.e. negligible, minor, marginal, critical and catastrophic). Amongst forty eight risk sources, top five risk sources which are supposed to adversely affect the company’s e-commerce performance are recognized through such categorization. The overall risk extent is determined by aggregating individual risks (under ‘critical’ level of severity) using Fuzzy Inference System (FIS). Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) is then used to obtain structural relationship amongst aforementioned five risk sources. An appropriate action requirement plan is also suggested, to control and minimize risks associated with e-commerce exercises

THE INVESTIGATION OF THE FACTORS ASSOCIATING CONSUMERS’ TRUST IN E-COMMERCE ADOPTION

The success of electronic commerce significantly depends on providing security and privacy for its consumers’ sensitive personal information. Consumers’ lack of acceptance in electronic commerce adoption today is not merely due to the concerns on security and privacy of their personal information, but also lack of trust and reliability of web vendors. Consumers’ trust in online transactions is crucial for the continuous growth and development of electronic commerce. Since Business to Consumer (B2C) e-commerce requires the consumers to engage the technologies, the consumers face a variety of security risks. This study addressed the role of security, privacy and risk perceptions of consumers to shop online in order to establish a consensus among them. The findings provided reliability, factors analysis for the research variables and for each of the study’s research constructs, correlations as well as regression analyses for both non-online purchasers’ and online purchasers’ perspectives, and structural equation modeling (SEM) for overall model fit. The overall model was tested by AMOS 18.0 and the hypothesis, assumptions for SEM and descriptive statistics were analyzed by SPSS 12.0. The empirical results of the first study indicated that there were poor correlations existed between consumers’ perceived security and consumers’ trust as well as between consumers’ perceived privacy and consumers’ trust regarding e-commerce transactions. However, the construct of perceived privacy manifested itself primarily through perceived security and trustworthiness of web vendors. While trustworthiness of web vendors was a critical factor in explaining consumers’ trust to adopt ecommerce, it was important to pay attention to the consumers’ risk concerns on ecommerce transactions. It was found that economic incentives and institutional trust had no impact on consumers’ perceived risk. Findings from the second study indicated that perceived privacy was still to be the slight concern for consumers’ trust in e-commerce transactions, though poor vi i relationships or associations existed between perceived security and consumers’ trust, between trustworthiness of web vendors and consumers’ trust, and between perceived risk and consumers’ trust. The findings also showed that the construct of perceived privacy manifested itself primarily through perceived security and trustworthiness of web vendors. It was found that though economic incentives influenced a consumers’ perceived risk in online transactions, institutional trust had no impact on consumers’ perceived risk. Overall findings suggested that consumers’ perceived risk influenced their trust in e-commerce transactions, while the construct of perceived privacy manifested itself primarily through perceived security as well as trustworthiness of web vendors. In addition, though economic incentives had no impact on consumers’ perceived risk, institutional trust influenced a consumers’ perceived risk in online transactions. The findings also suggested that economic incentives and institutional trust had relationships or associations with consumers’ perceived privacy. The findings from this research showed that consumers’ perceived security and perceived privacy were not mainly concerned to their trust in e-commerce transactions though consumers’ perceived security and perceived privacy might slightly influence on the trustworthiness of web vendors in dealing with online store sites abroad. Furthermore, consumers’ perceptions on the trustworthiness of web vendors were also related to their perceived risks and the concern about privacy was also addressed to perceived risks. Index terms: Perceived security; perceived privacy; perceived risk; trust; consumers’ behaviour; SE