According to the Business Communications Review International (Oct 2001, citing the UK Council for e-Business) around 59 per cent of senior business managers feel confused on the exact meaning of e-business. Recent studies by Amoni, Biren and Dutta (2001) show that on first observations these transformations within large corporations have not been very extensive and they have been a long way to go to fully exploit the potentials of the Internet. The principal areas considered in this study, centre on the classical marketing model of 4Ps - Product, Price, Promotion and Place (or distribution). The researchers also realized the importance of the technology and customer dimensions to any business and hence these were also included this study. From fig1 it can be easily seen that except for the customer relationship dimension most firms earn a cumulative score of less than 40% for all the four Ps. The results from this study give a general indication of the current understanding of the e-business contribution towards modern businesses. The Business Communications Review International (2001) quoting Andy Scott of the Confederation of British Industry says that the real gains to be seen in e-business do not stop at brochure ware and online sales but go much deeper than that. It is about customer relationship management (CRM) and the transfer of information right through the information chain.
The growth of e-Business.
E-Business is very new, its use is exploding very fast and this may explain why there is so much confusion and lack of appreciation of its value to business. Figures show that e-business is growing very rapidly, Deitel et al (2001) refers to a study by the Centre for Research in Electronic Commerce at the University of Texas in which an explosive growth from $322 billion in 1998 to $524 billion in 1999, a 68% increase, was found. Similarly, Blackwell (2000) reports that in a 1999 survey by KPMG found that a third of businesses across Europe are already able to conclude business transactions online.