WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY-PHILIPPINES
Mabini Extension, Cabanatuan City, Nueva Ecija
INFORMATION SYSTEM’S VITAL ROLE IN THE GLOBAL EBUSINESS
Kaila Beatrice R. Magtalas
Masters in Business Administration
Summer 2020-2021
In the 21st century that we live in right now, it is more common to see people owning at least
one gadget that they use in day-to-day activities, be it for personal or professional use. On
average, people all over the world spends 145 minutes surfing the internet (Tankovska,
2021). That is approximately 2 hours and 25 minutes spent staring at the gadgets and having
glimpses of advertisements posted on the internet. That is one of the main reasons why
businesses exert extra effort to create or maintain their online presence. There is a huge
opportunity that is present in the online community, when untapped by these businesses,
will be a huge loss for them. Some organizations saw an opportunity in engaging business
mainly through online channels rather than building the traditional brick and mortar stores.
These organizations are what we call now as e-businesses or those organizations that are
engaging business over the internet (Bloomenthal, 2020).
E-business is considered as one of the convenient ways to shop since it made it possible to
shop with just a few taps of the finger. E-businesses like Amazon, Shoppe, Lazada, Alibaba,
Etsy enables people to buy and sell commodities within their website. This action was made
possible because of modern technology and the information systems that we have today.
Normally, handling thousands of different sellers and accommodating millions of buyers are
either impossible or really hard to achieve. However, with the help of information systems,
the process is made easier and more efficient. Information system, in simpler terms, is what
makes it possible for business to easily gather, store and process their data. They will then
use this data to improve their operations. In the situation of Amazon, for example, uses a
number of information systems to give better services to their consumers and to gain
competitive advantage over their competitors. According to Mutwiri (2021), Amazon uses a
Simple Storage Service which is connected to their integrated database and an Amazon Web
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Service that enables customers and sellers and other stakeholders to access their online
platform. Amazon Web Services is also comprised of even more different systems with
different functionalities that is catered to address the needs of their stakeholders. Without
these information systems that Amazon use, it would be a very chaotic business
environment. It would be difficult for sellers and buyers to communicate, looking for
commodities has never been harder, even returning and sending orders will become difficult.
It is easy for us to use these online platforms because information systems made sure to take
care of the complicated processes. Another way information systems helps these kinds of
platform is with the advertisements that they show on the different social media networks.
The information systems store information on what places you search, items you often
browse, commodities you buy, places you went, and take into account your daily online
activities. They take the data and process it so they can tailor-made the ads that they give
you. Take Netflix for an example. In Netflix, different users are shown different show posters
on their platform depending on what kind of shows you watch. They also create a list of
recommendations and a list of similar shows to help the consumer find their next binge show
to watch. This is the product of Netflix’s information system. They gather data about their
users and use this data to tailor-make the service that they provide for each and every of
their users.
Another kind of e-business are those global business that outsource their supplies or
processes from all over the world. Take the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry.
BPO is the process of outsourcing or hiring other companies to do some of the business
processes for them like accounting, hiring, information technology services and others
(Bloomenthal, 2020). Instead of hiring people to do these processes inhouse, some
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organization sees that it is cheaper to outsource. In general, it would be extremely difficult
to outsource some processes in the organization especially if they are outsourcing from a
different place or country. MIS made it easier by consolidating the data in one place so that
the other party can easily access the needed data when they needed it. MIS provides a data
base for the raw and processed data as well as the reports and other data that each party
needs. Without MIS, engaging in the BPO industry will be more difficult. Another example of
organizations using MIS for their processes is the Just-in-time practice of Toyota. The
Japanese car manufacturing company is very well known for their just-in-time practice
which is vital for their success. Just-in-time, as the name suggest, the materials that they need
will arrive just in time when it is needed. It prevents them from spending a lot on inventory.
MIS’s vital role in this lies on the inventory management of the company. Since cars are
composed of several components and parts, it would be difficult for Toyota to actually
produce in one place each and every part that they use in manufacturing their products. They
source different parts of the car from the different parts of the world. This is where MIS
comes in. Since different parts come from different countries, timing is important. Toyota
uses an inventory system that helps them order parts and time it perfectly so that it will only
arrive when it is needed. Extreme precision is needed in this kind of operation and with the
help of the inventory information system, they are able to be at ease and continue on with
their operations. These are only a few examples of what information systems do in order to
help companies all over the world.
In our world today, internet is becoming more and more of a need rather than a necessity. In
order to ride the wave of modernization, businesses must learn to adapt to this rapidly
changing environment and continue or start making their online presence more visible. It
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would be difficult but with the help of appropriate management information system, it will
get easier.
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References
(Author), W. M. (n.d.). Amazon Business Information Systems. Data Acquisition and Management in
its Value Chain. GRIN. https://www.grin.com/document/538135.
Bloomenthal,
A.
(2021,
May
19).
Electronic
Commerce
(e-commerce).
Investopedia.
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/ecommerce.asp.
Tankovska,
H.
(2021,
June
30).
Daily
social
media
usage
worldwide.
Statista.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/433871/daily-social-media-usage-worldwide/.
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