The Age of Information Technology

Before the computerization era becomes mandatory for commerce, employees used to enter and maintain information in books then they had to look up the required information and perform any calculations and designs. Such critical tasks are definitely prone to human errors that any employee could perform any miscalculation. Given the importance of information processing in the commerce, it is not surprising that business of any types was among the earliest adopters of automated information processing technology.

Historically, daily operation in commerce requires high accuracy and reliable process that only a small group of staff can handle such tasks. For this reason, the use of computers in commerce or trade in any industries has deliberately increased year by year since they are designed to handle sophisticated tasks like storing and retrieving large amounts of information and at making calculations and designs at highest accuracy.

The Coming of Convergence

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Era In general, communication refers to exchange of ideas between two people or more and it is slightly different from that of telecommunication.

According to National Telecommunication and Information Administration in United States, telecommunication relates to any transmission, emission, or reception of signs, signals, writing, images and sounds or intelligence of any nature by wire, radio, optical or other electromagnetic systems. In fact, telecommunication supports the way people communicate and vice versa, especially in digital era. The coming of digital technology, known as the representation of two binary digits: ‘0’ and ‘1’, few decades ago has enabled us to convert any kind of information (voice, data, and video) into other forms.

This advantage of digital age, in turn, enables us to experience the era where people can communicate in many forms: voice (through telephone, handy talky etc), data (short message services/SMS, facsimile etc), and video (video streaming, video conference etc). This situation refers to the era people call as the convergence in digital technologies. The convergence of digital technologies including television, telephony, and computers has stimulated the reach of the innovations of the Internet that grew from inter-university computer networks in United States.

Furthermore, the growing popularity in those multimedia services, in fact, has increased the demand for Internet bandwidth. However, there has been no convergence on either the economics or the future policy framework of the Internet. While emerging information and communication technologies have strengthened the Internet community, we lack of economic and policy issues that must exist to sustain the growth and expand the scope of the Internet.

Why A Company Need Broadband Access?

Definition of Broadband

By definition, broadband is a high-speed transmission. This word is nowadays common in telecommunication and internet industry to describe Internet access via cable modems or DSL (Digital Subscriber Line), which provide faster connection than dial-up connection can do. Although, the terminology of broadband has been around for years, however, we will encounter different standard concerning the speed limit that the broadband provides. According to Answer. com, there are scholars that define broadband as connection with T1 (1. 5 Mbps) as the threshold.

However, others might refer broadband as high-speed connection up to T3 (45 Mbps). For instances, after the turn of the century, South Korea refers broadband Internet as DSL connection that provides up to 50 Mbps while they call 1. 5 Mbps service as light “connection” although other countries might consider the 1. 5 Mbps connection as broadband access. In short, we might provide analogy for broadband vs. dial up connection likes a brand new sports car and a horse drawn carriage implying the distant difference between the two connections in terms of speed.

Benefits of Having Broadband Access

Although the term of broadband has been widely used in the telecommunication and computer industry, we might entice to find out what the real benefits of using broadband connection for both individuals and corporations. In an article titled “why do I need broadband? ”, there is at least five obvious benefits for both individuals or corporations in relation to the use of broadband. They are as following: Broadband refers to “always on” connection.

Unlike dial up connection services that demand users to wait some time to get their costly modem connected into Internet, broadband provides more comfortable services since they should not wait for connections or invest in costly multiple modems. Since broadband is an “always connected” services, the charging method for subscribers of broadband access is fixed price per month. This situation benefits both users and service providers since they are able to budget their expense every month, Broadband connection is also relatively easy and simple to install (depending on how many PCs require broadband access).

Broadband connection has no relation with the use of telephone lines so that individuals or corporations can employ the lines more effectively for other purposes? At a minimum, the broadband connection provides users 40 times faster than dial-up. In addition, subscribers can choose the broadband option best suited to their business. What for Once an individual or corporation has broadband access, they might question what the high-speed connection for if they do not have specific need for such a high-speed connection.

Therefore, as broadband connection likes DSL is only a medium or a pipe, we should first consider what kind of information that they can deliver through the pipe. A good example of the use of broadband access is the Marriott, a famous hotel chain. They employ broadband connections for the benefits of communications between hotels within the chain and for the customers as well. Their objective in relation to broadband access is to meet the inflexible demands of today’s meetings and business travel. Depending upon customers’ needs, they offer high-speed Internet connections, superb sound and lighting systems, LCD projectors, and printers.

Moreover, Marriott provide an extraordinary level of connectivity and productivity with their high-speed wired Internet access. Perfect for real-time, interactive training sessions, rearrangement event schedules, and carry outing safe chat sessions, high-speed Internet gets 50 times faster than dial-up modem services (“Onsite Services”). In this manner, we can view what the Marriot do is match the customers needs. This is true since for some people, wireless LAN (Local Area Network) or WLAN connection will make business travel more productive.

It possible to gaining the flexibility and freedom to work and play on the go with excellent mobile performance and wireless LAN ability with the new Intel® Centrino™ mobile technology Mutual with limitless mobile positions, a Satellite Video Conference can present us:

• Capability to communicate in real time - without audio or video delay.
• Infinite location flexibility
• Protected data broadcast through encryption services
• Television-quality production and distribution
• The alternative to distribute live or prerecorded programming
• Two-way communication when grouped with audio conferencing services (“Onsite Services”)

J. MILOPOYLOS LTD

In this section, we will provide the use of Broadband for the benefits of a Greece company named J. MILOPOYLOS LTD. Things to be discussed including consideration in implementing broadband and mobile network within the company’s network and its strategy to employ the broadband into full potential.

Background of the Company

J. MILOPOYLOS LTD was founded in 1984. The company is the exclusive or sole representative and importer of the Swiss ice creams named Movenpick.

Nowadays, Movenpick are in the category of premium ice cream, they are prepared from materials of high quality and are addressed in all the consumers primarily of high incomes. The distribution includes the market catering (packing of 5 liters) in selectively hotels, restaurants and cruiser ship and the retail market in certain supermarkets. The movenpick range includes also the homonym coffee that is imported and distributed in the same channels as the ice cream.

Consideration of Implementing Broadband for J. MILOPOYLOS LTD

It is quite to tempting to associate “right technologies” with sophisticated new machines, robots, or any interactive holographic assistants. It turns out that the right technologies for small business might be merely a desktop computer or simply a digital voice recorder, depending on the type of business we compete with. Lisa Kanarek (2004), the founder of HomeOfficeLife. com and the author of some books on home office business, offers six ways for home or small business in deploying appropriate technologies that will increase productivity effectively and efficiently as follows:

In this situation, therefore, technology will help J. MILOPOYLOS LTD to save time while increase the company’s efficiency. More importantly, once J. MILOPOYLOS LTD finds out the benefits of broadband for the company’s business, they should define what things can be customized by broadband connection for their needs. Therefore, they should learn how to benefit the broadband connection and take time to use it. Equipping office of J. MILOPOYLOS LTD with the right technology will help the company to increase their productivity.

However, the technology in like broadband connection, PC, printer, fax, or any other electronic equipment, is only tools. The person using them determines whether the tools effectively and efficiently help to complete tasks or just become expensive and cute decoration on our workstations. Furthermore, users are responsible for maintaining their data and desktop computers while IT department, if any, are responsible to provide and create any supporting applications that helps users completing tasks efficiently and effectively.

Under such circumstances, the most important consideration of subscribing broadband connection for J. MILOPOYLOS LTD is to ensure that the company knows what the technology can benefit them, define and create value added services based on the broadband connection, and make sure that all employees know how to operate them.

Broadband Strategy for J. MILOPOYLOS LTD

The advancement in communications and internet technologies has spawn a new model of the world’s economy, borderless economy. The terminology refers to the existence of cross-nations or even cross-continents trade, commerce, and other economic process.

In internet era, companies need to remember that the Web is inherently global - when a company launches a Web site, it is accessible by a worldwide audience. Jennifer Lawton from the Kauffman Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership, reminds that Once we look at an e-commerce solution, we will need to consider the flow of information from our Web site into back-office operations. For instances, what we want when a customer pushes a button on our website whether it bring the customer into a client database, send shipping instructions to a warehouse, or charge a credit card.

Therefore, Lawton suggests that E-commerce is just a part of how we run business. The success of your online business lies on how attractive our products are. Under such circumstances, we suggest that J. MILOPOYLOS LTD create an attractive website in order to increase the sales volume from the increasing use of the distribution channels including the market catering (packing of 5 liters) in selectively hotels, restaurants and cruiser ship and the retail market in certain supermarkets.

The web site also benefits the company since prospective buyers can find useful information regarding the company’s products ranging from the imported homonym coffee to ice cream from the company’s website. The condition suggests that J. MILOPOYLOS LTD should have sustainable Supply Chain Management in order to reduce inventory, referring to the assumption that products are available when needed. Therefore, it will improve the time-to-market of products, reduce costs, and allow all parties in the supply chain to manage current resources and plan for future needs.

In typical Japanese manufacturing, the idea of having the time-to-market of products is done through the Just in Time (JIT) system. In addition, to obtain successful SCM, O’Brien and Springman (2004) suggests that companies should balance supply and demand since focusing entirely on the supply side may result in unnecessary capital expenditures, inventory investments or suboptimal solutions. Therefore, to best optimize the total supply chain, supply chain managers must have a detailed understanding of customer demand and then to manage this demand patterns of their customers.

Above all, to provide reliable internet access for prospective buyers in looking at the information of the company’s product and to sustain a large quantity of supply chain, therefore J. MILOPOYLOS LTD should subscribe broadband connection in order to prevent error in connection. Above figure is typical broadband connection for J. MILOPOYLOS LTD with connection speed up to 45 Mbps. The fast connection is important for the company in order to provide their customers with comfortable connection like being in a highway so that any transactions.

In the picture, we use fiber optics as a transmission medium since it provides greater reliability than coaxial or satellite. In the server, the company might place several pages of websites that are related to the company’s business like a page for conducting online transactions, pages for showing pictures of the company’s product, and a home page that navigating customers to browse over the websites’ contents.

Bibliography

1. Arnold, David. 2004, ‘Strategies for Entering and Developing International Markets’, InformIT, [Online] Retrieved June 2, 2005, Available at http://www. informit. com/search
2. ‘Broadband’, [Online] Retrieved June 1, 2005, Available at http://www. answers. com/topic/broadband Greguras, Fred M. ‘How is Electronic Commerce Changing Global Business? ’ [Online]
3. Retrieved June 1, 2005, Available at http://www. fenwick. com/docstore/publications/corporate/Changing_Global_Business. pdf. Kanarek, Lisa. ‘Make the Most of Technology in Your Small Business’, SCORE. [Online] Retrieved June 2, 2005, Available at http://www. score. org/om_8. html Lawton, Jennifer. ‘E-commerce: Is It Right for my Small Business? ’ SCORE. [Online] Retrieved June 1, 2005, Available at http://www. score. org/eb_10. html McKnight, Lee W. and Joseph P.
4. Bailey. 1995, ‘An Introduction to Internet Economics’, University of Michigan Press. [Online] Retrieved June 2, 2005, Available at http://www. press. umich. edu/jep/works/McKniIntro. html O’Brien, Kevin and Brian Springman. 2004, ‘Optimizing Supply Chains, Understanding Demands’, CRM Buyer. [Online]
5. Retrieved June 1, 2005, Available at <http://www. crmbuyer. com/story/35892. html> ‘Onsite Services’, 2005, [Online] Retrieved June 2, 2005, Available at http://marriott. com/meeting/meetings/onsiteServices. mi? WT_Ref=mi_left ‘Why do I need broadband? ’ Retrieved June 2, 2005, Available at http://www. startups. co. uk/YUAsx-poP66y3A. html

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