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eBay Inc.; information technology & strategy

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eBay Inc.; information technology & strategy
1.0 INTRODUCTION
The reason for this research is to carry out an analysis of eBay Inc. with concentration on the relationship between its information technology and its strategy. The research contains an analysis of the company’s e-Business activities and its business operations.
The report started with a general overview of eBay Inc. where the company’s history was briefly stated. Its resources, products and competitors were also described. The company’s general environment were described and analyzed. Thereafter, its competitive context was examined from the standpoint of its SWOT analysis. Its market and financial positions were also examined and evaluated.
Further analysis was done by examining the eBay Inc.’s engagement in the e-business industry. Its business model was analyzed and its impact on the company’s operations and revenue was examined as well. This was done in the light of Don Rappa (2010)’s theory of business model.
In addition, the impact of the internet on eBay Inc.’s operations was examined in the light of theories by Carr (2003), Porter (2001) and Rappa (2010). The shifts in its strategy in response to the challenges in the internet technology market were also assessed and discussed.
The report concluded with a brief review of the analysis and the result derived from it. The result sort to determine whether the future of the company is guaranteed in its industry market; in other words, if it will not be overwhelmed by the challenges in its industry and its market at large.

2.0 GENERAL OVERVIEW OF eBAY INC. eBay is an online auction and e-business company, headquartered in San Jose, California, USA. It was founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995 (ebayinc.com, 2011). eBay Inc. is the owner of the popular eBay.com, which is an online auction and shopping website where lots of people and businesses buy & sell different varieties of goods & services worldwide. eBay is world’s largest online marketplace (ebayinc.com, 2011). In addition to



References: 1. Aron Hsiao (2011) How did eBay start [Internet]. Available from: http://ebay.about.com/od/ebaylifestyle/a/el_history.htm [Accessed 17th April, 2011] 2 3. Bunnell David, Richard Luecke (2001). The eBay Phenomenon: Business Secrets behind the World’s Hottest Internet Company. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 4 9. eBay Inc. (2011) Overview of eBay [Internet]. eBay. Available from: http://www.ebayinc.com/who [Accessed 17th April, 2011]. 10. eBay Inc. (2011) History of eBay [Internet]. eBay. Available from: http://www.ebayinc.com/history [Accessed 17th April, 2011]. 11. Edward Chen, T. (2005) “Leveraging IT for a Competitive Advantage- Case of eBay” .Massachusetts Review. Volume, VI, NO. 2, 2005 12 13. Hasker, K. and Sickles, R., (2010); eBay in the Economic literature: Analysis of an auction marketplace [Internet], Available from: http://www.springerlink.com/content/e274485r74w4r013/ [Accessed 17th April, 2011] 14 17. Paulo Sobral (2000); Internet and Business transformation [Internet], Available from: http://www.libsearch.com/contributor/21901 [Accessed 19th April] 18 19. Rappa, M, (2010) Managing The Digital Enterprise (internet): Business Models on the Web. Available from: http://digitalenterprise.org/models/models.html [Accessed 23rd April 2011] 20 21. Seely Brown et al (2008), “Shaping Strategy in a world of Constant Distruption” [Internet]. Available from: http://www.cioindex.com/nm/articlefiles/2772-CIO-BusinessModels.pdf [Accessed April 25th 2011]. 22 23. Turban, E. et al. (2006) Electronic Commerce: A Managerial Perspective. Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ <http://web.viu.ca/thomasb/mba501/ebusiness_stages.htm> [Accessed 23rd April 2011).

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