The success of a "rapid baby steps" approach to implementing e-commerce that I advocated in my last column (Can e-commerce learn from ERP`s mistakes?) is very dependent on open standards-based component technology.
The advantage of a component-based approach to e-business is that it lets implementers install what is needed now in a controlled, step-by-step way. Most urgent needs can be prioritised. Once those have been proven, then more components can be integrated easily and quickly to fill the gaps as and when the business is ready or needs to use them. That is the nature of components technology.
But it is also about agility and future-proofing the business. Becoming a successful e-business means much more than just having an attractive and user-friendly Web site.
E-business works in at least three dimensions: toward the customers, business partners (the suppliers) and employees - the people who have to make the e-business work. Once companies realise this, they come to understand that creating a successful e-business can involve making changes and improvements in many, if not all parts of the business processes.
Becoming a successful e-business means much more than just having an attractive and user-friendly Web site.
Paul Whalley, Guest columnist, ITWeb
But isn`t that the road ERP took its customers down over the last decade - the massive business re-engineering projects with finalisation somewhere on the horizon? Not really. Those were the days of monolithic proprietary ERP systems. Today, components have taken the implementation complexity out of ERP and are doing the same for e-business.
Flexible adaptability
A major advantage of a components-based strategy is that it delivers a solution that is flexible enough to adapt to the business` practices, rather than the other way around. What is more, it can continue to adapt as circumstances change - as they invariably do these days. That is why the changes needed to establish an e-business need not be as traumatic as those of ERP in the past, though change there has to be, because an e-business is a move to new ways of doing business.
But how agile does a company need to be? The more agile the company, the better the chances of survival. Just look at what is coming down the line currently. A year ago most company executives knew nothing about WAP (the Web-enabled cellphone protocol) or ASP (the deployment of business applications over the Internet). Today, no company can afford to ignore these new e-business developments. That is why future-proofing your systems has become so important.
Forrester Research, in a recent e-commerce report (Commerce Software Takes Off, March 2000) warns: "Pressure from senior executives to get (e-commerce) sites up ASAP drives myopic e-commerce teams to select feature-rich, but proprietary packages. When the inevitable need for additional functionality arises, users find their choices limited or non-existent."
No company today can afford such a technology lock-in. That is why backbone and front office platform products that embrace component technology are becoming crucial for future-proofing your business.
Orchestrating change
Only open-standards, components-based technology lets you orchestrate change quickly, enabling you to make changes where necessary while still integrating with the rest of your solutions.
Forrester agrees. It calls it platform orchestration, saying that it believes a single dominant software strategy will emerge over the next couple of years as firms synchronise IT and e-business.
It is an approach, it says, that will enable firms to "balance the need for constant innovation against the benefits of site longevity" and will see firms, having established an open and extensible standards framework, use component applications for competitive advantage.
While the ability to adopt a step-by-step implementation strategy and agility and flexibility are core benefits of componentisation, speed is also critical.
Imagine setting up a retail catalogue Web site capable of handling over 20 000 orders or 35 000 items a day from day one. Add the complexity of dealing with logistics service providers on two continents for order fulfilment and returns, plus the need to provide customers with up-to-the-minute information on goods in stock, 24-hours-a-day, 365-days-a-year.
The system that provided these features, and several others, would have to combine distribution and financial functionality while integrating simultaneously with four divergent interfaces: front office, suppliers, logistics and payment institutes.
That is no small project by any standard, especially as the company concerned - boo.com - wanted the system up and running as quickly as possible to reap the benefits of being first to market.
It was completed - from project start to launch - within three months.
Such is the power of component technology.
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