The document discusses electronic commerce (e-commerce), including how it can be used for community services, shopping, communication, and business-to-business applications. It predicts strong growth in internet trading from $500 million in today's estimates to $5 billion by 2001. While implementation costs are currently high, e-commerce is becoming more established with emerging payment standards and more businesses discovering benefits like increased revenues and cost reductions.

1. What’s Electronic Commerce? “ A modern business methodology ... to cut costs while improving the quality of goods and services and increasing the speed of service delivery .” Frontiers of Electronic Commerce Ravi Kalakota, and Andrew B. Whinston

13. EXAMPLES OF ELECTRONIC COMMERCE TODAY If we consider some of the goals of businesses with regards to electronic commerce: higher revenues through exposure to additional customers; cost reduction; lower product cycle times; faster customer response; and improved service quality, we see how dramatically a company's bottom line can be influenced with the addition of electronic commerce. A number of pioneering firms are implementing electronic commerce solutions today and are finding new ways to save and make money .

18. Consumer finds something she wants to buy at a “shop” on the Net Consumer sends on enciphered request for payment to her bank The electronic bank sends back a secure packet of e-cash Consumer sends the e-cash to the shop Verification and remittance of actual funds Consumer Public Key The shop sends the packet of cash to its bank Merchant Bank Merchant Server Shop Consumer’s Bank Shop 1 3 6 2 5 4

19. Agents and Intermediaries To help organisations conduct business on the Web without having to set up costly servers and devote dedicated personnel to monitor orders and deliveries and other transactions, a new breed of Agents or Internet E-commerce Solution providers have sprung up.

20. Agents and Intermediaries Another similar service provider’s site looks like this: