Analysis of strategic issues at bewari.com: a B2B case study in the Middle East.

Rao, Ananth ; Awan, Mahmood A.

CASE DESCRIPTION

The main subject of this case is B2B e-commerce in the Middle East. Secondary issues examined are: strategic factors facing the company examined in the case study; the B2B business model; privacy and security issues of e-commerce; and new business strategies for B2B.

This case has a difficulty level of four and is best utilized in a senior level Strategic Management / E-Marketing course. Depending upon the depth of analysis, the case can be taught in three to six hours and requires a preparation time of three to six hours.

CASE SYNOPSIS

The introduction of Internet use and the resulting growth in e-commerce has changed the service industry in the 21st century. These factors have led to changes in online transactions and have introduced new, Internet-only services companies, forcing traditional service institutions to quickly develop and implement an e-commerce strategy.

The current case analyzes strategic issues surrounding e-business at Bewari, a B2B company established in June 2000 that allows companies in the Arabian Gulf region to buy and sell goods and services online. Bewari is a hypothetical company. At the request of the real company's management, its name is kept confidential since Bewari did not want to disclose its operations to its competitors. This case study is chosen since the Arabian Gulf region is unique in terms of culture, tradition, business practices, human and organizational values compared to those in developed economies. Most of the economies in the region are oil-rich. Business development practices in one economy in a particular sector are rapidly imitated by businesses in the neighboring economies in the region. The economies in the region form a major trade bloc of major importance to neighboring European and Asian economies.

Bewari has chosen to create and maintain the highest standard B2B customer service and trading facilities in the Middle East. The case shows that Bewari:

* is an ideal partner for helping companies reach new markets in real time

* is agile enough to respond to fast changing market opportunities

* provides innovative online B2B services, enabling B2B firms to extend their reach and enhance their competitive standing, and integrates supply chain.

Nevertheless, growing pains have ensued. From its inception, Bewari has given access to the resources and culture thought necessary to allow it to succeed. While Bewari was given the right resources and freedom to succeed, it was asked to do so within an organization incapable of producing the desired product. Bewari faces pressure from its stakeholders to improve performance and maximize synergies from recent alliances. In addition, decisions and options regarding Bewari must be taken into consideration as part of Bewari's overall strategy.

CASE ISSUES AND SUBJECTS

Competitive Strategies               Resources Allocated to Bewari

Vision Statement                     Marketing Niche
Target Market/Customer-based         Hyper-competition
Corporate Culture                    Synergy
Cannibalizing Existing Customers     Privacy Issues
Internet Security

BACKGROUND

Bewari's management is facing a set of challenging issues detailed in Part 4 of this case. It is therefore important for business students to evaluate the issues facing Bewari's Management and to focus on: (a) the key strategic factors for success, and (b) the strategies to be implemented and how the company responds to the challenges in the fast-growing B2B market in the Arabian Gulf. In the process, students are also expected to analyze the political, economical, societal, technological and legal factors impacting Bewari. Students are encouraged to use the following tools for their strategic analysis:

a. A SWOT analysis based on Porter's five-force model

b. Recommend short-, medium- and long-term strategies for Bewari to implement

Students should go through Appendix -1 as suggested background reading for the case analysis. From the case analysis they are expected to find specific answers to the following questions:

i. What are the strengths and weaknesses of Bewari?

ii. What are the opportunities and threats facing Bewari?

iii. What are the strategic factors facing Bewari?

iv. How does each of Porter's five forces impact on Bewari?

v. What are the security and privacy issues relevant to online e-commerce?

vi. What are the supply chain management issues involved in B2B e-commerce?

The case is organized into six parts. Part 1 highlights the background; Part 2 discusses the conceptual framework of e-commerce. Part 3 discusses Bewari's business, its customers and products. Part 4 sets the stage for strategic analysis of the case. Part 5 identifies the student tasks, and Part 6 concludes the case.

SETTING THE STAGE: E-BUSINESS CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

The adoption of e-business requires a framework guiding sustainable business development. Timmers (1999) draws on theoretical constructs relevant to the transformation introduced to value creation by the adoption of e-business practices and proposes an analytical framework and method for constructing e-business models. According to Timmers, a business model refers to the architecture of products, services and information flow including a description of the various business actors involved and their roles. Such a model provides understanding how the business mission and objective of any of the companies that are actors within the model are realized. Timmers proposes that the major elements of the analytical framework are based on: coordination, cooperation-competition, customer value and core competency issues. The major implication that a business model could have is positioned at a strategic level, thus the reasons for the development of a business model are relative to the strategy of the firm (Hammel and Heene, 1994).

Depending on the type of trading partners, there are many categories of e-business including, Business to Business (B2B), Business to Consumer (B2C), Consumer to Business (C2B), Consumer to Consumer (C2C), Government to Business (G2B), Government to Citizen (G2C), Business to Government (B2G), and Intra-business (Organizational Unit to Organizational Unit). Without the use of face-to-face operations, all e-business transactions are performed electronically by using computer and communication networks. The three principal categories of e-business applications are:

1. Electronic markets or e-market places: buying and selling goods and services;

2. Inter-organizational systems: facilitating inter- and intra-organization flow of goods, services, information communication and collaboration.

3. Customer service: providing customer service and help, handling complaints, tracking orders, etc (Senn, 1996).

BEWARI'S BUSINESS MODEL

Bewari is a B2B company helping businesses in the Arabian Gulf region to reach new markets in real time agile enough to respond to fast-changing market opportunities. Through Bewari's portals, buyers can find, compare and procure products and services from the familiarity and convenience of their desktop Internet browser. Suppliers can list their products and services and sell them through online catalogues or auctions.

Bewari's target market includes business and government organizations that actively trade in goods and services within the region. It also facilitates the purchase of goods/services enabling sellers to trade at most competitive prices through auction-induced marketing. It also provides secure and affordable space to market to over 3500 trading partners, who have negotiated more than 35,000 online tenders (e4all, 2006).

Vision and Mission

   The vision of Bewari is to be the leading business-to-business
   (B2B) online marketplace in the Middle East, and play a pioneering
   role in transforming regional economies into an internet-based
   trading environment, creating outstanding value for customers and
   increased ROI.

   The mission of Bewari is to maximize the business potential of its
   customers in the Middle East by providing them with innovative
   online B2B services, enabling them to extend their reach and
   enhance their competitive standing and supply chain integration.

The CEO brings to Bewari the expertise gained in the high-tech community of Silicon Valley. During his 20+ years of service, the CEO has led a strategic sourcing program worth more than one billion dollars; brought more than one hundred million dollars in savings to the holding company, one of the world's largest consumer packaged goods (CPG) firms; launched an e-marketplace whose current membership consists of global industry leaders with a combined revenue of over nine hundred billion dollars; and developed a go-to-market strategy which captured a market worth 1.3 billion dollars.

Structure

Bewari implemented an alliance structure which is currently loose. The structure currently has a heavy marketing focus as the key on branding the service.

Customers

Bewari has a base of 60,000+ trading partners who have negotiated 50,000+ online auctions valued at over 2.5 billion dollars. In addition, buyers have transacted 85,000+ electronic purchase orders. The major customers fall into following segments:

* Government and semi-government organizations like ministries, public services departments and municipalities.

* Large businesses like global companies, manufacturers, producers, agents, and financial institutions.

* Trading companies like business groups, and commodity traders operating on a local or regional level.

* Small companies like businesses with smaller trade requirements.

Being a government-initiated profit-driven online B2B initiative, Bewari aims to reduce procurement costs of its members. Over 60% of the online auctions are conducted by the private sector while 40% are done by the government. The government is the largest buyer in the region and 60% of the procurement business arises from the government sector. Bewari offers convenience services like purchase and sales access under one brand to create "stickiness" and increase switching costs for the consumer.

Business Model

Bewari uses a franchise model in each member country. One of the major advantages of this approach is to ensure that the B2B operation is through a 100% locally-owned company. Bewari provides partner technology, training, ongoing support and much more--essentially all of its accumulated intellectual property and experience necessary to establish and operate the business.

The number of member partners has increased substantially over the last three years (Figure.1). Partnering with Bewari is unquestionably the lowest-risk option for the establishment of an electronic marketplace anywhere in the Arabian Gulf region. Bewari is operating in a market space which is expected to grow exponentially over the next few years as the trend of electronic procurement in the region follows the rest of the world.

Bewari has to its credit numerous awards and accolades such as the: Quality Appreciation Program Award 2005; IT Weekly--Arab Technology Award 2005; Super brands Award in 2003, 2004 and 2005; American Business Council Business Award 2004; World Summit on the Information Society in 2003; MEED Award for the Best IT Project in 2002; Publishing Group ITP: Best B2B Marketplace; Best B2B World Economic Forum in Davos (Switzerland) and Oracle Application World in Paris; "Best Content Provider in e-Business" at the Gulf Brand of the Decade Award.

Products and Services

The range of commodities transacted online through Bewari include oil and gas, building and construction, healthcare, automotive, agriculture, information technology, engineering, electronics, office equipment, stationery and the FMCG industry (Figure.2).

[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]

Auctions and tendering (Reverse Auctions):

Bewari supports both seller and buyer online auctions, to fully maximize the value of B2B transactions conducted through the marketplace. Customers can create new auctions, to meet specific purchasing requirements in a transparent and efficient manner; auto-extend Auctions, so that auctions extend if new bids are received in the closing minutes, driving competitive behavior among suppliers; place bids online so that suppliers can bid in real time at online auctions and monitor bidding action so that users can see what's happening in the marketplace around the clock.

Catalog management, hosting and search facilities:

Bewari enables manufactures and suppliers to post their products and services on the market place, providing them with access to new markets without the associated start-up costs, enabling them to acquire new customers without the need for a physical presence. Cutting--edge taxonomy and categorization features enable suppliers to review, approve and audit their catalog data, load pricing for the entire marketplace or adjust price bands for specific customers.

Spot buying:

Buyers can source products using the powerful search facilities of Bewari's marketplace or via company's trading partner directory, enabling them to leverage cost-scales and efficiencies, buy goods at the best-fit price and find goods and services not available to them in their local market.

Project collaboration:

Bewari's project collaboration platform enables members from the construction industry and other collaboration sectors to centralize electronic documents align business processes and create a detailed audit of project activities. The tool delivers projects with reduced administrative costs, faster completion time, improved accountability and fewer errors.

Online procurement training:

In order to maximize their online procurement efforts, Bewari offers comprehensive training opportunities on how to create and award auctions, make spot purchases, develop catalog content, and utilize the notification features of the portal. Customers can access the company's online E-learning training materials, at any time

Procurement consulting:

Bewari's procurement expertise has led to world-class standards of procurement consulting ranging from analysis of current processing structures to the development of strategic plans.

Member services and support:

Bewari provides attractive membership services, which include buyer memberships, supplier memberships, integration memberships, strategic e-sourcing, and catalog management.

Link Service:

Recently, Bewari has come up with the idea of building a national directory which includes information about all the companies in the region. This directory enables the company to promote or ask for trade leads. All the companies can communicate with each other through E-mail or MSN Messenger. Also, they can upload images of their products and build a virtual showroom. Each company can also have its own website. In this case, the local Economic Department collects nominal fees from the registered companies and integrates their database with all the information collected from the companies in the back-office system. The agreement between Bewari and the Economic Department enables the government to extend this service to the public. They can utilize the kiosks located everywhere for Link Service.

Dubai Tea Trading Center (DTTC):

In January, 2006, Bewari partnered with the Metal and Commodity Trading Center (MCTC) in creating tea trade portals. MCTC is engaged in creating storage and blending facilities for teas from various countries in the region to boost regional buying and selling. The tea portal allows tea-related organizations to showcase their products and services, create trade leaders to buy and sell, and identify new partners in different countries.

Bewarimylink.com:

On June 6, 2006, Bewari launched Bewarimylink.com a service for all businesses and companies registered with the Department of Economic Development. Its mission is to expand the scope of commerce in the region. This service offers a compelling e-commerce proposition for organizations from every industry regardless of size.

Competitors

The following firms are Bewari's major competitors:

* Ariba.com: It is an international company (with the head office in the US) which manages E-auctions. It undertakes mainly consulting activities, and is not very focused on e-services.

* Quadreu.com: It focuses on oil and gas activities. It manages only auctions.

Apart from these, there are many small competitors who have recently entered e-business and will present a formidable competition to Bewari in the coming years.

Security and integrity

Bewari is powered by Oracle, which provides technology and scalability to provide a safe and reliable environment for conducting business over the Internet. As part of the marketing plan, Bewari has adopted project collaboration software that reduces the initial project cost and the cost of ownership by centralizing electronic documents, and aligns business processes throughout the supply chain. Bewari handles procurement activities through its reliable and secure platform. It is considered one of the most important tools for achieving accountability, credibility, and transparency. Bewari is also considering starting a traditional B2C E-commerce website, however, it feels that people should be ready for such a service, and now is not the right time.

Impact of Bewari on customers

Bewari's services have tangibly impacted customer businesses as detailed below:

a. Reduced Costs

** Regional Water and Electricity Authority saved over 48% in stationery costs.

** Civil Defense: Saved over 1 Million in local currency on fire-fighting equipment.

** Airlines: Saved over 2.5 Million in local currency on in flight menus and 2 Million in local currency on mineral water.

** Local municipality: Saved over 120,000 in local currency on desktop computers.

** Police: Saved over 14% on uniforms, shoes, helmets and other equipment.

** Eritrean government: Saved over 32% on 2500 PCs, monitors and peripherals

** Local government: Saved over 14% on average across all agencies

b. Reduced Procurement Cycle Times

** Government workshop: From 3 weeks to 10 days for automotive spare parts

** Ports Customs and Free Zone Corporation: From 3 weeks to 10 days for cabling and tires

** Airlines: From 3 weeks to 24 hours for corporate printing.

** Regional electricity and water supply authority: From 20 days to 5 days for electrical items

** Local municipality: From 2 weeks to 7 days for chemicals and insecticides o Construction company: From 6 months to 4 weeks for specialized light fittings

** Local health and medical services: From 5 days to 2 minutes to prepare summary of quotations

c. Extended Market Reach

** Small IT products suppliers who had never supplied to government: These suppliers were awarded over USD $2M in Government contracts within 60 days of participating in company's auctions.

** A large private group company in the manufacturing industry: Expanded supplier base from one to six suppliers for specialized pallets, overcoming non-competitive pricing and poor responsiveness.

** A large IT company specializing in large corporate contracts: Extended market reach into small-medium opportunities by deploying low-cost resources to bid on company's auctions.

** A leading transport company with ad hoc printing requirements: Reduced costs by 50% by awarding business to a non-traditional printing company with which there had been no prior relationship.

** The World Food Program had been unable to source 1.5M polypropylene bags: Accessed 7 quality suppliers and awarded the business in 18 hours, meeting a critical deadline for the provision of humanitarian aid.

ISSUES FACING BEWARI'S MANAGEMENT

Bewari still competes with standalone startups to recruit and retain the best people, and it has a difficult time, despite working to establish a startup friendly in Dubai. In B2B industry, low to medium barriers to entry exist, and the alliance/partnership strategy is imitable by other traditional e-commerce providers. Bewari's management is facing the following strategic issues and challenges

Systems (Processes)

Bewari as an organization must keep its operations and systems in order to maintain the startup environment. It develops technologies and relationships on its own. A system is not currently in place to share information and learning across Bewari's online expertise. Advantages exist via association with the company's network and through the connection to regional E-Government and Economic Department portals.

Performance

Multiple B2B services are currently being offered to help gain customer acceptance. An initially promising advertising campaign is helping to develop Bewari's name as synonymous with B2B e-commerce. Service charges vary according to the type of membership in Bewari. For suppliers it ranges from $1,000 to $2,400 a year. For buyers, the charges vary from $1,000 to $10,000 a month. The number of quarterly transactions shows trends of consistent growth over the last three years (Figure.3). By the end of 2003, the trade volume of Bewari was $520 Million. It exceeded 2.5 billion dollars by the end of 2005. In the first quarter of 2006, the volume of trade stood at $200 million. Is this growth sustainable?

Resistance to Change

Buyers (end users) have been using their traditional or electronic procurement system for some time. They are happy with the results. Buyers are asking why they should change, and what value is added to their businesses by implementing changes.

Trust (Security and Privacy)

Buyers and suppliers need to ensure that their transactions have a high level of security and privacy. In addition, they need to be aware of security features available in the application. The challenge is: how can trust be created in the minds of B2B buyers and suppliers?

Laws and regulation

Buyers and suppliers need to be sure that their electronic transactions are accepted legally by the court. The challenge is how to reassure buyers and suppliers of this.

Infrastructure

Buyers and suppliers need to have an internet connection in order to start using any web-enabled e-commerce application. The challenge is how to increase internet penetration on the part of buyers and suppliers.

Stakeholders

Bewari is facing pressure from its stakeholders to improve performance and take advantage of synergies from recent alliances.

STUDENT TASKS

Students are expected to use the findings from the Porter's five forces model and SWOT analysis, to guide the management of Bewari, specifically in regards to the following:

(a) How can Bewari continue to sustain its performance in the hyper-competitive B2B environment?

(b) Is there cannibalization in Bewari and its associates?

(c) What strategy should Bewari take in the emerging B2B scenario?

(d) How can change be implemented among buyers and sellers of Bewari?

(e) How can trust be developed among the associates?

(f) How can transactions be legally bound with certainty?

(g) What is the future of Bewari in the era of e-commerce?

CONCLUSION

There is a scarcity of e-commerce case studies in the Arabian-Gulf region. The present case is of importance to business students in the region since it stimulates discussion concerning strategic issues and challenges facing Bewari. The case study also contributes to understanding the local environment and the challenges of e-commerce for practitioners and academicians as well as business students. The case is equally useful for E-marketing students in that it facilitates understanding of the role of intermediaries in an online B2B and G2B scenario. Further, it can also be used as a tool to understand new successful online businesses in the Middle East.

Appendix

Background Reading Material on Bewari

E-business has received much attention from all types of businesses recently. Rapid developments in e-commerce and e-technology have accelerated intra-business and inter-business online transaction during recent years. Recent research articles [Sodhi 2001; Skjott-Larsen et al. 2003; Lu and Antony 2003; White and Daniel 2004] have attributed e-marketplace adoption to the rapid development of the internet-enabled supply chain. Faloon (2000) and Grieger (2003) noted that e-marketplaces emerge in different industries, supporting different forms of exchange of goods and services, involving different types of actors, and reducing the transaction and operating costs inherent in supply chains. Further, in his study, Zhu (2004) explores firms' incentives to join a B2B exchange that provides an online platform for information transmission, by using a theoretical model involving asymmetric information in the form of a game. He concludes that individual rationality of participation in the online exchange reflects the tradeoff between information transparency and data confidentiality with implications for the microstructure design (e.g., data access rules) of B2B electronic marketplaces.

As information technologies (IT) develop, novel approaches to business process redesign emerged. The rapid expansion of e-commerce values in the past few years have convinced many people that a new economy has emerged. Organizations today frequently integrate Internet technology to redesign processes in ways that strengthen their competitive advantage. However this competitive advantage needs a sustainable focus since success breeds imitation and invites more entries.

Eric (2005) explores the various B2B e-business models using in-depth interviews and case studies conducted with Australian Agribusiness firms. They identified 10 B2B e-business models with rationales for these selections based on organizational size, the industry sector, and the current state of e-business model application.

Information systems strategies for competitive advantage

Studying the evolution of business organizations has received much attention in organization theory and MIS research (Phan, Vogel and Nunamaker, 1995). Because organizations are not internally self-sufficient, they require resources from the environment, and thus become interdependent with those elements of the environment with which they transact. Organizational theorists (Pfeffer and Salancik, 1978) argue that organizations develop internal and external strategies which seek to minimize the uncertainty arising from dependence on the environment for resources.

As technology advances and the e-business market develops, market niches open and close frequently, creating rapid changes in the market. The prevalence of technical innovations may be regular, sporadic, or rare; these patterns of change have different implications for business organizations. When innovations occur often, a niche may open up and the organization competes to take advantage of cost savings and market penetration that often result in better profits and greater market share.

From the information systems (IS) perspective, the value chain model (Porter, 1985) highlights interdependence activities in businesses where competitive strategies can be best applied and where IS are more likely to have strategic impact. As IT developed, novel approaches to business process redesign emerged. Most organizations today use Internet technology to redesign their processes in ways that provide new, more competitive advantages. Through the infrastructure of existing B2B exchanges in the e-market place many organizations will eventually be able to integrate activities of their value chain encompassing suppliers, customers, and distribution channels within an industry or across industries.

However, Porter (2001) has argued that the key question is not whether to deploy e-business now to take advantage of Internet technology, but how to deploy it. Gaining competitive advantage requires building on the proven effective strategic principles. Business enterprises can gain competitive advantage by operational effectiveness, doing the same as competitors do but doing it better, and by strategic positioning, doing things differently from competitors in a way that delivers a unique type of value to customers. Key principles of strategic positioning are: goals that target long-term ROI, distinctive value chains, trade-offs for uniqueness in the market, strategies that fit together, and continuity of corporate direction. Porter also argued that Internet technology should be used as a "complement to" rather than a "cannibal of" traditional ways of competing. Without understanding how to deploy Internet technology, entering e-business can bring disastrous consequences.

To succeed, companies also need to search and implement innovative strategies that capitalize on both the power of the Internet and changes in both traditional and electronic markets. Companies that run e-businesses should have tight supply chain relationships with customers, suppliers and distributors (Scarborough and Spatarella, 1998). Similarly, established companies that view e-commerce as a stand-alone appendage to their business would be less likely to succeed in their efforts.

In the process of forming a corporate strategy to respond to the challenges of environmental change, normative thinking requires that a firm should analyze its industry forces and value chain activities in order to identify opportunities for IT innovation (Wheelen and Hunger 2006). The choice of an appropriate strategy could then lead to superior performance. In the case of e-commerce, firms implementing such initiatives should carefully analyze external forces, internal resources and their core competencies. The outcome of this process should be reflected through a tight integration between corporate strategy and e-commerce (Chang, Jackson and Grover, 2003).

Timothy and Samuel (2004) studied a sample of B2B e-marketplace survivors to identify the attributes linked to financial performance. Their B2B framework depended on strategic management literature of industrial organization economics, the resource-based view and competitive heterogeneity. They test the conceptual model through regression analysis of revenue and profitability drivers captured in a survey of 272 surviving e-marketplaces. Their results provide insights into successful strategies for the B2B e-marketplace and significant variables related to ownership, funding levels, speed, and continuity and to some extent the scope of service offered.

Despite the benefits provided by e-commerce, however, adopting e-commerce does not ensure a competitive advantage, because the technologies are open and available to competitors (Lord, 2000). The ability to mobilize IT resources in conjunction with other resources is critical to superior performance of the firms (Bharadwaj, 2000). Therefore, firms that see e-commerce integrated with their strategic orientation would be more likely to leverage complementary assets and enhance both efficiency and effectiveness.

REFERENCES

Bharadwaj. A. (2000) A resource-based perspective on information technology capability and firm performance: an empirical investigation, MIS Quarterly 24, 1, 169-196.

Chang, K, Joyce, J. & Varun, G. (2003) E-commerce and corporate strategy: an executive perspective, Information and Management, 40, 663-675.

e4all. (2006) The Official Magazine of Dubai E-government, Issue 29, March 2006

Eric, N. (2005) Types of B2B E-Business models commonly used: an empirical study on Australian agribusiness firms, Australasian Agribusiness Review, Vol.13

Faloon, K. (2000) E-Marketplace to lower costs in supply chain, Supply House Times, Vol 43, 6, 43-44.

Greieger, M. (2003) Electronic Marketplaces: a literature and a call for supply chain management Research, European Journal of Operational Research, 144, 2, 280-291.

Hammel, G. & Heene, A. (1994) Competitive Based Competition. New York: John Wiley, 111-147.

Lord, C. (2000) The practicalities of developing a successful e-business strategy, Journal of Business Strategy, 21, 2, 40-43.

Lu, D. & Antony, F. (2003) Implications of B2B marketplace to supply chain development, The TQM Magazine, 15, 3, 173-179.

Pfeffer, .J. & Salancik, G. (1978) The External control of organizations: A resource dependence perspective, New York: Harper & Row.

Phan, D. Vogel, D. & Nunamaker. K. (1995)Empirical studies in software development projects: field survey and OS/400 study, Information and Management 28, 271-280.

Porter, M. (1985) Competitive Advantage, New York: Free Press.

Porter, M. (2001) Strategy and the Internet, Harvard Business Review, 63-78.

Scarborough, M. & Spatarella, J. (1998) Getting behind the business of electronic commerce, Journal of Cash Management, 18, 4, 42-46.

Senn, J. (2006) Capitalization on electronic commerce, Information Systems Management, Summer 2006.

Skjott-Larsen, T. Kotzab, H. & Grieger, M. (2003) Electronic Marketplaces and supply chain relationships, Industrial Marketing Management , 32, 3, 199-212.

Sodhi, M..(2002) Applications and opportunities for Operations Research in internet-enabled supply chains and electronic marketplaces, Interfaces, 31, 2, 56-67.

Timothy, M. & Bodily, E.(2004) Strategic indicators of B2B e-marketplace financial performance, Electronic Markets, London, 14, 4.

Timmers, P. (1999) Electronic Commerce: Strategies and models for business to business trading. New York: John Wiley Wheelen, L. & David, J.(2006) Concepts in strategic management and business policy, 10th ed., New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

White, A . & Daniel, E. (2004) Electronic Marketplaces: an empirical Study in the UK healthcare sector, International Journal of Electronic Business, 2, 6, 603-624.

Zhu, K. (2004) Information transparency of business-to-business electronic markets: a game theoretic analysis, Management Science, 50, 5, May 2004.

Ananth Rao, University of Dubai

Mahmood A. Awan, University of Dubai

ENDNOTE

(1) For the purpose of maintaining anonymity the name of the real company has been changed to Bewari.com, and referred in the discussion as Bewari for simplicity

Figure 1: Growth of Member Partners

Quarter    Member Partners

Q4-00          41
Q1-01          59
Q2-01         116
Q3-01         225
Q4-01         374
Q1-02         482
Q2-02         835
Q3-02        1125
Q4-02        1350
Q1-03        1528
Q2-03        1750
Q3-03        2029
Q4-03        2370

Note: Table made from pie chart.

Figure 3: Growth of Transactions at Bewari

       2001     2002     2003
Q1       11      785     4597
Q2       45     1483     8527
Q2      238     2093     9490
Q2      706     2378     7598

Note: Table made from bar graph.