E-COMMERCE: A NEW BUSINESS MODEL FOR THE FOOD SUPPLY/DEMAND CHAIN

The use of electronic commerce for quality control and cost cutting efficiencies by the food and agricultural industries in the United States is the focus of this paper. The food industry engages in e-commerce through 1.) Internet shopping for consumers called business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce 2.) Business-to-business (B2B) Internet market discovery exchanges used by food suppliers at any point in the supply chain, and 3.) Business-to-business (B2B) relationships that reduce costs and increase efficiencies in the procurement, storage and delivery of food to retail stores or distribution centers. This third use of e-commerce is the most highly developed and widely adopted. It allows retailers to share information about consumers' purchases and preferences with food manufacturers and farmers and for tracking food products' characteristics, source, and movement from production to consumer. This circle of information allows high quality and consistent products to be consumed at lower prices. This paper is about the development of e-commerce in the food industry, the economic concepts and goals that it meets, and the changes it brings to the industry. E-commerce both fosters and demands vertical coordination. It favors consolidation of firms. It changes the business culture from one of adversarial relationships to one of cooperation and trust. It changes the historical supply chain into a supply/demand loop while it lowers the cost of food. Policy issues arise around monopoly power, privacy, a diminution of variety, and the demise of small, undercapitalized firms.Industrial Organization, Marketing,

Differentiated duopoly under vertical relationships with communication costs

Platform sharing across manufacturers has recently become common practice in the automobile industry. Its important objective is to reduce procurement costs by taking advantage of the commonality of components, but this often reduces the degree of product differentiation. We investigate this trade-off through analyzing a model that incorporates manufacturer-supplier relationships with communication costs into a standard differentiated duopoly model, and find an interesting inverse relationship between the advantage of platform sharing and the costs for manufacturers to communicate with their potential suppliers. The result suggests that the information-technology revolution could be a reason for the recent prevalence of platform sharing in the automobile industry, and predicts that similar phenomena would prevail in various other industries as the IT revolution makes further progress. We then consider an extension of our model that incorporates an option for the manufacturers to jointly establish a B2B electronic marketplace in order to reduce their communication costs, and explore its welfare implications. Although the joint establishment of an e-marketplace could be viewed as an anticompetitive activity, we find that in our framework it increases welfare.Communication cost, differentiated duopoly, electronic commerce, electronic marketplace, manufacturer-supplier relationships, platform sharing, product differentiation

An exploratory study of Australian agribusiness organisations and their selection of e-business models for conducting B2B e-commerce

The increasing importance and complexity of selecting appropriate e-business models has seen the need to develop a framework to assist businesses in this process. Through depth interviews and case studies, this paper explores the behaviour of Australian agribusiness organisations in their choice of e-business models for conducting B2B e-commerce. The results show that the choice of model is a complex multi-stage process

Evaluating eREVERSE auctions (EeRA): A research note

This eGISE network paper seeks to evaluate issues relating to the implementation of electronic reverse auctions (eRA) within local government procurement processes. The adoption of an eRA invites pre-qualified suppliers to compete with each other for a specified good or service. Consequently, there is a unique opportunity for the buyer to receive a reduced cost through the successful bidder. However, the literature identifies a number of adverse effects within these arrangements depending upon the nature of the buyer/supplier relationship. The objectives of the research involves identifying a set of business scenarios to demonstrate the impact of different eRA strategies in this respect. This will be achieved through a structured case analysis approach to enable qualitative data to be modelled through a visual toolset simulation. It is believed the outcome of the investigation will provide valuable insights into the complexities associated with the eProcurement process

Electronic marketplace-to-marketplace alliances: emerging trends and strategic rationales

The electronic marketplace domain has recently witnessed the joining together of a number of previously independent marketplaces and the formation of collaborative alliances between others. This study seeks to determine the nature or type of cooperative arrangements or alliances that are currently being forged between electronic marketplaces, and the strategic rationale that is leading to this observed alliance formation. The findings of the study are based upon an examination of statements made to the press by marketplaces undertaking strategic alliances. This published data was supplemented with face-to-face interviews with managers at three relevant electronic marketplaces. Three distinct types of alliance are observed; the merger between previously separate marketplaces, the acquisition of one marketplace by another and the formation of an interoperability agreement between two marketplaces. Three rationales for alliance formation were observed: an increase in the number of buyers or suppliers in a given market sector that can access the marketplace (an increase in scale of operations), an increase in the breadth or depth of services that are offered to users of the marketplace (an increase in the scope of operations) and providing the ability to exchange information across multiple tiers of a supply chain. A broader discussion of the findings is given and suggestions for further research are made

E-Markets and Changing Trends

This paper discusses the role of e-markets as intermediaries in the Australasian B2B e-space. The discussion and findings of this paper are from a research project that investigated the business and operational issues of these intermediaries as highly volatile business entities in 2002 and an evaluation of these same e-markets in 2005 to determine the changing trends. This paper presents business opportunities, revenue models from intermediary services, factors contributing to success and the challenges e-markets faced in 2002 and in 2005

An Empirical Analysis of the Determinants of Success of Food and Agribusiness E-Commerce Firms

E-commerce's value creation in agricultural and food markets will only occur to the extent that e-commerce firms exist throughout the supply chain. The problem is that e-commerce firms throughout the agricultural and food supply chain have faced a serious challenge in staying in business. Many have been forced to exit the market, and only a few have survived to develop into functional web-based businesses. The objective of this research study is to identify characteristics that are associated with successful e-commerce firms throughout the agricultural and food supply chain. Relevant e-commerce and agricultural e-commerce literature suggests several characteristics that influence the success for agricultural and food e-commerce firms. A limited-dependent variable technique, logistic regression, is used to relate websites' characteristics to their probability of survival.e-commerce, food chains, survival probability, logistical regression, Agribusiness,

The Evolution of an Internet Market Exchange and Value System: Examples From The Motion Control Industry

This manuscript examines the evolution of internet value systems in the motion control industry. We believe the primary reason behind the inconsistent performance of that industry\u27s adoption of the internet in the supply channel was largely due to poor strategy. Using a the concepts of bias exchanges and game theory it is suggested that intemet strategies such as disintermediation and first-mover advantage were elusive because firms focused too much on technology and not enough on customer value. Lessons for managers and future decisions are offered

Analysing B2B electronic procurement benefits – Information systems perspective

This paper presents electronic procurement benefits identified in four case companies. The benefits achieved in the case companies were classified according to taxonomies from the Information Systems discipline. Existing taxonomies were combined into a new taxonomy which allows evaluation of the complex e-procurement impact. Traditional financial-based methods failed to capture the nature of e-procurement benefits. In the new taxonomy, eprocurement benefits are classified using scorecard dimensions (strategic, tactical and operational), which allows the identification of areas of e-procurement impact, in addition the benefits characteristic is captured (tangible, intangible, financial and non-financial)