电子商务专业外文翻译--电子商务战略挑战.docVIP

外文原文： The Strategic Challenges of Electronic Commerce Introduction 11th Century Europe saw the emergence of credit-based banking systems and financial instruments such as bills of exchange. These concepts remain with us, in their modified form, to this day (Chown, 1994). They underpin all modern forms of commerce. The arrival of information technology (computers and telecommunications) has raised the prospect of radical change to this traditional model. The rise of the Internet (electronic commerce), since the advent of the World Wide Web, has provided an easy to use communication channel for businesses to contact current and potential customers. The emergence of the Internet as a general communication channel has also given rise to the possibility of widespread electronic commerce. Even though there is still much debate relating to electronic payment for commercial activities, this is clearly an area of growth. It is difficult to say how large the Internet is. Hoffman Novak (1996) quote a number of surveys (OReilly, FIND/SVP, Times Mirror and CommerceNet) which suggest that there are at least 10 million Internet users in the United States alone. The number of computers (hosts) connected to the Internet topped 9.47 million (Network Wizards, 1996) as of January 1996. Note that a single host supports anywhere from a single user to, in some cases, thousands of users. As of March 21, 1996, 24,347 firms were listed in Open Markets (1996) directory of Commercial Services on the Net, and there were 54,800 entries in the Companies directory of the Yahoo Guide to WWW (Yahoo, 1996), with the total number of Web sites doubling approximately every two months. Jim Clarke, the chairman of Netscape, estimated the Internet has 40 million users in 1995 with growth at 8% per month (Clarke, 1995). The Internet is only one aspect of technology. Businesses require information and supporting systems (processes) to handle the data - over time these systems have become computerised (IT)