E-commerce - Cape Peninsula University of Technology

Chapter 2: Literature review Page 9
begun to utilise the opportunities offered by trading activities through the
Internet (La & Kandarnpully, 2002).
As different regions of the world take e-retailing in different ways and at
different rates, it is interesting to contemplate how quickly the United States
(US) population has adopted the Internet and it is easy to understand why.
Historically, the US has been a country in which new technologies are
assimilated fairly rapidly, given the relative lack of economic constraints and
the manufacturing realities of the time (Burt & Sparks, 2003). Windham and
Orton (2000) further explains that the US is the source of most Intemet
technologies and it is not surprising that it should be in the lead in their
application. The Internet reached as many Americans in the first six years as
telephones did in four decades. Everyday, Intemet access is becoming
available to a growing percentage of the US population (Windham & Orton,
2000:3). These authors argue that of all the wealthier economies in the USA,
Asia and Europe, more than half the combined population has Internet
access and it is inevitable that more consumers will choose to make
purchases through the Internet as access becomes more widespread.
The increasing importance of &Commerce was apparent in a large study
conducted by researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology (Provost,
2000). It was found that electronic commerce was taking off both in terms of
the number of users shopping as well as the total amount people were
spending via Internet based transactions. Provost (2000) also found that
through the connectivity provided by the Internet, the range of goods and
services offered can be extended. It is feasible for retailers to sell millions of
products via their websites as the technology brings buyers and sellers
together regardless of their geographical location. Clearly, electronic
commerce brings new forms of market to e-customers and e-retailers, partly
out of new ways to do business, but originally because of the technologies
that are now in use.