B2B e-commerce
Soft & Natural Ltd. is one of the largest textile manufacturing companies in New Zealand. The main focus of the business is on the production of textile materials. Soft & Natural relies on the timely delivery of wool and synthetic fibres from their suppliers. In addition, Soft & Natural has a factory for processing raw cotton and producing cotton fibre. The company deals with over 600 cotton growers to ensure the supply of cotton for the factory operations. The cotton fibre is used as a direct input for the textile manufacturing facility. Approximately 30% of the textile material produced by Soft & Natural is distributed to textile retailers and the rest is supplied to apparel manufacturers.
Based on the Soft & Natural scenario above, you are required to:
a) Draw the supply chain management diagram for Soft & Natural Ltd.
b) Describe three (3) transactions that could be expected to take place within the upstream activities of Soft & Natural’s supply chain. For each of these three (3) transactions
i) describe one way in which that transaction can be supported by an e-commerce technology of your choice (such as EDI).
ii) provide one major reason to explain the suitability of that particular type of technology
iii) give one main benefit that is likely to occur as a result.
E-Commerce Infrastructure
a) Compare and contrast ISDN with ADSL as an Internet connection service for E-Commerce.
b) E-Commerce is supported by LAN and WAN infrastructures to provide connectivity between the diverse members of the Internet community. This infrastructure includes both wired and wireless components. The IEEE standard for wireless Ethernet, 802.11b, and Bluetooth are competing technologies. Compare and contrast these two technologies for the purposes of supporting mobile computing and for connectivity to a wired LAN
