E-Business Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words

E-Business - Case Study Example Hoffman & Novak (1996:51) described the internet as a "phenomenal marketing opportunity". This same definition was later echoed by Palmer & Griffith (1998:45) when they state that, the internet has created a new revolution in marketing by providing much more than just a new medium through which organization communicate to the public. E-marketing has become an important phenomenal for Business to Business, Consumers to Consumers as well as Business to consumers marketing. As the fight of market shares and quest for product success continue, e-strategy has offered marketers and businesses all the necessary tactics, and methods to give their product a break through, or remain competitive (Frost et al. 2001). This assignment examines and evaluates the supply chain management functions of an ebusiness. Using Wal-Mart as a case study, the paper examines the electronic business platform of the organisation with attention on the supply chain. Supply chain management (SCM) is a tactical and management tool employed by present day business to efficiently integrate suppliers, manufacturers, warehouses, and customers so that a company's merchandise is produced, distributed at the right quantities, locations, and the right time (Cheng, Lai & Gunasekaran 2006). This is to minimize system wide costs while satisfying service-level requirements (Cheng, Lai & Gunasekaran 2006). ... Using Wal-Mart as a case study, the paper examines the electronic business platform of the organisation with attention on the supply chain. 1.1Overview of Supply Chain Management Supply chain management (SCM) is a tactical and management tool employed by present day business to efficiently integrate suppliers, manufacturers, warehouses, and customers so that a company's merchandise is produced, distributed at the right quantities, locations, and the right time (Cheng, Lai & Gunasekaran 2006). This is to minimize system wide costs while satisfying service-level requirements (Cheng, Lai & Gunasekaran 2006). Today, SCM gained momentum and received due attention from practitioners and researchers. It has become present day managerial competitive weapon for improving performance (Ramsay 2000). To minimize wastages and meet up with customers demand. Customers and suppliers are important stakeholders. "Stakeholders are those individual or groups who depend on the organisation to fulfill their own goals and on whom, in turn, the organisation depends" (Johnson et al 2005:179). An organisation SCM set the pace and the platform for this to take place. Wal-mart is the largest grocery retailer in the United States with estimated 20% of the retail grocery and consumable business as well as the largest toy seller in the States having 22% share of the market, and the highest private employer with about 1.9million workers and employees. The company had a net income of US$11.3Billion in 2007. Thus, this study was initiated to investigate the application of supply chain management strategy in Wal-mart in its electronic business platform. Using Porters competitive advantage, Porters value chain framework, and the SWOT analysis, the company was

Blogging and Privacy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Blogging and Privacy - Essay Example Ellen Simonetti (2004), a Delta Air Lines flight attendant, for example, was fired after she posted some problematic photos of herself in uniform on her blog. Simonetti might want to show her blogger friends her daily life as a flight attendant through those pictures, but unfortunately, her pictures became a reason for losing her job. In general, visiting Simonetti's blog and looking up her pictures are exactly what most bloggers usually do. Yet, if someone would report her pictures to somebody without her permission, and so Simonetti might lose her job, this is certainly a violation of her privacy. If so, in what ways might Simonetti protect her personal information and privacy Regardless of any possible personal security issue, the number of blogs is still steadily increasing, and the purposes of using blogs is becoming more diversified from one blog to another blog. Hence, taking such diversity into account, bloggers must carefully consider the level of disclosure of personal information based on the content posted and the targeted audience. The rest of this analytic argumentative paper is organized as following. In the first two sections, two opposite tendencies of current bloggers towards their personal information, such as disclosing versus anonymity or hiding, are discussed with benefits and disadvantages. Then, in the next paragraph, it suggested way to efficiently manage such personal information problem in blogging will be addressed. Lastly, another helpful suggestion is explained while concluding this essay. Most of the bloggers reveal their personal information about themselves on blogs. Especially, young generation has a propensity to disclose their personal information. According to a research conducted by David A. Huffaker, Ph.D. student at Northwestern University, and Sandra L. Calvert, professor of Psychology at Georgetown University," Many teen bloggers expose their first name (70%), age (67%), and contact information (61%) as an email address" (2005, para.10). The reason why teen bloggers reveal such personal information often seems unintentional. This is just because their purpose of maintaining blogs is often to establish a close relationship with other bloggers. By sharing such type of personal information given above, the teen bloggers match the age groups that they want, and keep in touch with each other outside the blogs, too. From this point of view, blogs are an extension of the real world to teenagers in which they make more friends and share a matter of daily life. In addition to disclosing personal information, however, they also post diaries and photos which altogether have a chance of causing a security problem as which happened to Simonetti, a fired stewardess mentioned above. In regard to this issue, Mr. Henry G. Rhone, a vice provost at Virginia Commonwealth University, asserted that "[teen bloggers] have never had any problems with [their personal information and contents on their blogs], so they just assume that when they're online, they're safe" (quoted in Read, 2006, para. 17). As Mr. Rhone pointed out, Simonetti's case is rarely happened phenomenon for bloggers to realize its

ENG C292 Concrete Engineering & Durability of Concrete( Curriculum Essay

ENG C292 Concrete Engineering & Durability of Concrete( Curriculum BACHELOR OF ENGINEERING IN CIVIL) - Essay Example (www.cowi.com, 20-). Since the concrete is fundamentally a man-made material, it is quite possible to control its characteristics and behavior by altering its mix design specifications and adding admixtures to it. Hence, by the careful selection of appropriate materials for preparing the concrete, and close monitoring of its curing once it has been cast, the qualities of concrete can be significantly enhanced to meet the requirements of a particular structure. There are certain design requirements associated with every location and type of a structure. If the structure is made of concrete, the concrete needs to be customized in order to combat the challenges brought to the structure by the weather conditions and temperature of a particular location. This needs an appropriate evaluation of the required properties of concrete by studying the literature for the history of challenges associated with a particular climate. Also, the achievement of required results requires monitoring the w hole process right from the start that involves concrete making, casting and finally the curing. Of these, the last two processes are majorly field-specific and require careful supervision from the workers in the construction site. The first part i.e. preparation of the mix design is the most influential process in achieving the desired durability in the concrete. This paper discusses the common methodologies used for the achievement of durability in concrete structures. Concrete has long been in use as a construction material for a large variety of structures including bridges. A number of long-lived concrete bridges have been constructed in the past. They include the Shakh Isa bin Salam Bridge in Bahrain and the bridge over the Lerez River at Pontevedra in Spain shown in the figure-1 and figure-2 below: In his report, (Paeglitis, n.d.: 1) has mentioned that more

Qatar Balance of Payments Analysis Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Qatar Balance of Payments Analysis - Assignment Example The fact that Qatar relied to very solely on investments in the oil sector lead to very low investment inflows which then kept the income balance of Qatar very low. The income from foreign direct investment was generally low in comparison with that of other countries. The deficit in the income balance of Qatar in 1997-2007 estimated to have averagely $ 2 billion which is responsible for the deficit in balance of payment during that period. According to CIA World Factbook (2013), statistics on the economy of Qatar shows that the country imports more service than what they export. Since 1997 to 2007 the general amount of exports from Qatar were estimated to be about $12 billion while their imports were estimated to be about $38 billion. However, their major exports were goods while the service industry contributed small portion of their exports. This therefore led to more imports on the service which then amounted to deficit balance on the services. This then shows that the general services balance of Qatar had been in a deficit before the country took a step to diversify their economy in 2008. The external borrowings of Qatar have also been increasing between the years 1997 and 2007 which was an estimate of about $ 1 billion increase. The increase in the borrowings of Qatar was from both the private and foreign sources. These needed to develop the natural gas in Qatar. This therefore led to the increase in the current transfers of the country of Qatar between 1997 and 2007. With increased current transfers and unfavourable balance of trade on services and income, the country of Qatar has persistently registered a deficit in its balance of payment in

Viacom is Successful in 2011 Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Viacom is Successful in 2011 - Case Study Example From this point, Viacom would have entirely taken a number of steps and guidelines in its acquisition so as to create better synergies. First and for most, Viacom had to stick to most of the established strategic goals and objectives including its vision that aims towards becoming a globally content provider. This could be done through ensuring that all the financial services have been duly delivered to customers. The other factor that was extremely necessary was the aspect of detailed planning. Here, planning can be taken to encompass cost saving (hard synergy) and revenue enhancement (soft synergy). Cost saving basically has to do with the aspects of redundancies such as the logistics, production, admin, among others, while Revenue enhancement on the other hand has to do with the aspect of cross-selling as well as strength-weakness and strength-strength matching (Hietala, Kaplan, et. al, 2002).   In summary, the ultimate cornerstones of for Viacom’s creation of better synergies can be taken to include the setting up of comprehensive and extensive strategies in terms of revenue enhancement and financing, beefing up operations through cross referencing and joint contracts acquisition, establishment of advanced management and ICT systems, and finally the aspect of establishing an outstanding culture that will enhance massive co-operation at the management

Drugs abuse Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Drugs abuse - Essay Example In the article by Belz Tennessee has enacted laws that have make it difficult for drug stores to sell prescribed drugs (1). The laws also hinder the ease access of prescribed drugs by users. The article describes the laws effective way of dealing with the access of prescribed drugs. For instance, patient are required to take a urine test every few months to determine the level of illness or drug use. In additional, the patient is also required to visit a doctor for illness analysis before they could acquire a 30-day refill (Belz 1). From the results of patients, any medical practitioner is required to request the results before they could prescribe drugs. From the database created the state has been able to flag illegal instances of access of prescribed drugs. This approach has been exceptionally effective in the states objective to fight the abuse of prescribed drugs. According the Mayo Clinic Staffs, people who legally consumer commonly abused prescribed drugs often face the risk of getting addicted without proper prescription (1). For this reason, addiction may lead to illegal acquisition of prescribed drugs. Consequently, consumption of prescribed drugs should be done under accurate and definite prescriptions. The Mayo Clinic Staff provides ways that a patient could ensure they have correct prescriptions for their drugs. Firstly, the patient should ensure they are provided with the correct medication. The patient should then constantly check with their doctor for medical and drug analysis. This ensures the patients receives proper medication. The direction of use of the prescribed should then be followed effectively. The patient should also be educated enough by the supplier or practitioner on what their medication does (Mayo Clinic Staff 1). This includes education on side effects of the drugs. The prescriptions of another patient should not be used by another person. If a patient ignores these

Controversy - School Of The Americas Research Paper

Controversy - School Of The Americas - Research Paper Example   Till 1995 most of the wars in Latin America had settled down. At that time the US support for the region was commendable. Several aid packages from the US had also helped Americas in reaching political and economic stability in the region. The prominent aid programs included the Brady debt Relief Proposal which helped the Americas in ending the long period of debt induced recession. Other aid proposals included NAFTA and a 1995 rescue package led by Washington that helped in restoring economic stability in Mexico (Hakim, 2006). However, critics are of the view that despite all the efforts made by the US the foreign policy of the US towards Latin America is without any sense of direction. The relationship has further gone down after the 9/11 incident. Washington has lost its interest in the Latin American affairs and seems only to interfere when the trouble becomes unbearable. With this background, it is obvious that the Washington policies would lose their support in the region. Only a few states of Latin Americans are of the view that the US is a dependable partner and can actually play a positive role in solving the Latin American affairs. Currently the critics are of the view that the US relations with Latin America are at the lowest stage and the failure of the US policies in Latin America, the stubborn attitude of the US over several issues and the reluctance of the Clinton and Bush administration to accept the strong domestic constituencies are indicative of the failure of the US in the region.