Example of E-Commerce Success - AIRASIA

AirAsia, as the second Malaysian National Airline, provides a totally different type of service in line with the nation's aspirations to benefit all citizens and worldwide travellers. AirAsia provide the electronic ticket or e-ticket service which is used to represent the purchase of a seat on a passenger airline, usually through a website. Once a reservation is made, an e-ticket exists only as a digital record in the airline computer. Customers usually print out a copy of their receipt which contains the record locator or reservation number and the e-ticket number. Such service takes the form of a no frills - low airfares flight offering, 40%-60% lower than what is currently offered in this part of Asia. Their vision is "Now Everyone Can Fly" and their mission is to provide 'Affordable Airfares' without any compromise to Flight Safety Standards.

AirAsia was initially launched in 1996 as a full-service regional airline offering slightly cheaper fares than its main competitor, Malaysia Airlines. Before 2001, AirAsia fail to either sufficiently stimulate the market or attract enough passengers from Malaysia Airlines to establish its own niche market. The turnaround point of AisAsia is in 2001, while it was up to sale and bought by Tony Fernandes. Tony Fernandes then enrolled some of the lending low-cost airline experts to restructure AirAsia’s business model. In late 2001, AirAsia was re-launched in Malaysia as a trendy, no-frills operation with three B737 aircraft as a low-fare, low-cost domestic airline.



The Factors that cause AirAsia Success:


1. Low cost per average seat kilometer
AirAsia focused on ensuring a competitive cost structure as its main business strategy. It has been able to achieve a cost per average seat kilometer (ASK) of 2.5 cents, half that of Malaysia Airlines and Ryanair and a third that of EasyJet. AirAsia can lease the B737-300s aircraft at a very competitive market rates due to the harsh global market conditions for the second-hand aircrafts because of the September 11th event in 2001.

2. Low distribution cost
AirAsia focus on Internet bookings and ticketless travel allowed it to lower the distribution cost.

3. Attractive ticket price
With the average fare being 40-60 % lower than its full-service competitor, AirAsia has been able to achieve strong market stimulation in the domestic Malaysian air market (Thomas 2003). For instance, the fare for the trip from Kuala Lumpur to Penang on AirAsia starts from 39 ringgit. Comparing to trip by bus charge 40 ringgit and 80 ringgit by car. The effect of attractive low fare is more travelers switching from bus to air, similar case as Ryanair in Europe.

4. Good Management Team
AirAsia value proposition is more sophisticated than Ryanair placing equal emphasis on brand reputation and customer service/people management, by a senior advisor to AisAsia’s top management team. AirAsia pursue a Ryanair operational strategy, Southwest people strategy and an Easyjet branding strategy.


By:
Wong Zheng Hwa 0701815

The History & Evolution of E-Commerce

Electronic commerce, commonly known as e-commerce, consists of the buying and selling of product or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. The amount of trade conducted electronically has grown extraordinarily since the spread of the Internet. A wide variety of commerce is conducted in this way, spurring and drawing on innovations in electronic funds transfer, supply chain management, Internet marketing, online transaction processing, electronic data interchange (EDI), inventory management systems, and automated data collection systems.

History of E-Commerce

The meaning of "electronic commerce" has changed over the last 30 years. Originally, "electronic commerce" meant the facilitation of commercial transactions electronically, using technology such as Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) and Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT). These were both introduced in the late 1970s, allowing businesses to send commercial documents like purchase orders or invoices electronically. The growth and acceptance of credit cards, automated teller machines (ATM) and telephone banking in the 1980s were also forms of e-commerce. From the 1990s onwards, e-commerce would additionally include enterprise resource planning systems (ERP), data mining and data warehousing.

Perhaps the earliest example of many-to-many electronic commerce in physical goods was the Boston Computer Exchange, a marketplace for used computers launched in 1982. The first online information marketplace, including online consulting, was likely the American Information Exchange, another pre-Internet online system introduced in 1991.

When the Web first became well-known among the general public in 1994, many journalists and pundits forecast that e-commerce would soon become a major economic sector. However, it took about four years for security protocols (like HTTPS) to become sufficiently developed and widely deployed.

In the dot com era, e-commerce came to include activities more precisely termed "Web commerce" -- the purchase of goods and services over the World Wide Web, usually with secure connections, with e-shopping carts and with electronic payment services such as credit card payment authorizations.

Evolution of E-Commerce

The evolution of e-commerce can be attributed to a combination regulatory reform and technological innovation. Through Internet (which played an important role in the evolution) appeared in the late 1960s, e-commerce now took off with the arrival of the World Wide Web and browsers in the 1990s.

Here is the timeline of the evolution of e-commerce,

1984
EDI, or electronic data interchange, was standardized through ASC X12. This guaranteed that companies would be able to complete transactions with one another reliably.

1992
Compuserve offers online retail products to its customers. This gives people the first chance to buy things off their computer.

1994
Netscape arrived. Providing users a simple browser to surf the Internet and a safe online transaction technology called Secure Sockets Layer.

1995
Two of the biggest names in e-commerce are launched: Amazon.com and eBay.com.

1998
DSL, or Digital Subscriber Line, provides fast, always-on Internet service to subscribers across California. This prompts people to spend more time, and money, online.

1999
Retail spending over the Internet reaches $20 billion, according to Business.com.

2000
The U.S government extended the moratorium on Internet taxes until at least 2005.


By:
Lim Hooi Ting 0701396

SINYEE in da hs~~

Hi, my name is Chua Sin Yee, I'm 20-year-old girl. Although I have a proper name, but my friends like to call me "fatty", i also dont understand. I am a down to earth person, always greet people with a great smile. I appreciate those appreciate me, especially my beloved family and friends, not to mentioned my boyfriend too. They are the one who give me moral support when i was in a dead end.

Usually, I choose to read light articles and novels to kill my free time. Suprisingly, I have a record of finishing five novels a day!! I usually read chinese novels, therefore my Chinese is much more higher than my English level.

I like to log in to www.facebook.com to keep in touch with my friends.Www.google.com is a loyal choice of mine to search for informations for my assignments. Other than that, I like to visit failforum.com to gain new knowledge in many criteria as there are various people from various category share thier knowledge. Furthermore, wble.utar.edu.my enables me to communicate with my tutors and lecturers, and also obtain latest announcement about my course. Last but not least, www.chinapress.com helps me to know the latest news bout places and also save money on buying newspapers.

That is all for now about me then, bye ^^

By:
Chua Sin Yee 0701651

Simple Girl's Introduction

Hi there, I'm Hooi Ting, a girl who comes long long way from a small fish village in Taiping, Perak to Sg Long pursue her studies. How old am I? Secret...... But I think I'm the eldest in our class. I'm just a simple girl, who easily get happy and satisfied by normal things or inccident, but, there is always a but. If something that i cant tolerate happens, My temper will blast off and become a person that u cant even imagine.

My hobby nothing special than the others. During the free time, I like to go for shopping, watching movies, last but not least, sleeping and eating. I felt fortunate because I dont get fat easily even though I eat alot, but this is also a weakness of mine because I wanted to grew slightly meaty as I am too slim for now.

The pages that I like to view in the internet is www.chinapress.com.my, www.yahoo.com, www.friendster.com, www.google.com, and chinese.cari.com.my. These websites help me alot in many ways, studies, keep in touch with friends, entertainment, and keep myself updated with latest news and information.

By:
Lim Hooi Ting 0701396

~~I am ME!~~

Hi world! I am Zheng Hwa and I’m known as Zheng Hwa since I was born. I use to study in Chong Hwa Independent High School. I met a lot of friends whom I treasure a lot until today. They are like my best pal ever, who will always stick with me through thin and thick. Therefore, I’m thankful that I went to that school, despite the stress being in a Chinese private school, I’m still thankful.

After going through hell in high school, I decided to go to UTAR to further my tertiary studies. I am doing my 3rd year of Accounting course now. My campus is located in Sg Long. In the final year of my uni life, I hope I can get a better result when I graduate.

Actually I don’t have any specific hobbies, but I usually like to watch some drama, play computer games when I am free. Besides that, I am also like to sleep and eat, because I feel that when I am sleeping and eating are the happiest moment in my life.

The following are some website that I usually visit when I’m surfing the net. First of all, I always go to Youtube. Reason being is that it contains the world’s largest number of videos, uploaded by people all around the world. From educational videos to entertainment videos, all sorts of videos are just there. It’s pretty convenient as I always like to watch music videos of musicians I like.

Another website that is a must to visit when I’m online is Facebook. It is a very useful tool to connect with people who are far away from us. It helps me keep in touch with friends whom I don’t always see by leaving each other messages so that people still keep in touch with one another.

Enough of entertainment and networking, the internet service also provides us a firm foundation to learn unlimitedly. One useful tool that can help us learn faster and more conveniently is Google. Whenever I come across issues that I’m not quite sure about, Google it away and I’ll get my answer fast and accurate.

I also always visit a famous blogger’s blog. His name is Kenny Sia and he’s born in Eastern Malaysia. He owns a funny and witty blog. His tone of writing and sarcasm simply amaze me. He will then take some pictures and post them on his blog and make comments about it. Therefore, a frequent visit to his blog sometimes lifts up my spirit.

One last site that I want to mention and introduce to everybody who can read Chinese, is the ChinaPress! It has e-newspaper included in the website and it is updated daily just like the traditional newspaper! Besides, china press is also very resourceful and accurate in reporting news and getting latest issues.

This is all about me and the websites I like to visit. I hope you all can visit these websites and have a great time reading them!

That's all for about me...Goodnite!!!

By:
Wong Zheng Hwa 0701815

~ Little Corner Bout Me ~

みんな,ごきげんよう ^^

I'm Yann Guan, a girl who wished to be twenty every year, although it is not possible as the reality is always cruel and the time waits for no one T_T I am interested in Japanese Language, had taken the Japanese Language level 1 provided in Utar, but sadly, they currently never provide level 2 for us this year in Sg Long campus... So what I did to learn Japanese is by watching animation and Japanese Drama ( lame excuse ^^), haha.

I'm currently a Year3 Sem1 student taking Accounting course in UTAR SgLong Campus. Usually having the attitude of studying the exam in last minute (self-reflecting =.=''' ) So, the new target for me this sem is, must study harder as this is the last year of my University life.

I have the most common hobbies among teenagers nowadays, which are on line and play computer games. I even have a nice name derived from my hobby, 宅女, cause my on line time is considered too much for them ^^ But other than that, i also like to read magazine and comics during my free time.

There are few of my favorite website, firstly, the www.google.com, which are very useful to search for links, and also journal articles for assignments. www.youtube.com is a very useful website to watch video clips from various categories. 3rdly, www.hotmail.com is used to check my emails from my friends. If I wanted to keep myself updated with different informations, i will visit chinese.cari.com.my/myforum/ . Last but not least, www.facebook.com , to keep in touch with my friends and post photos. Another link to introduce to viewers, the www.viwawa.com and also www.meetoto.com. This two links is sort of entertaining and can have fun in it.

I think that is all for now, if I continue writing, my friends definitely chase me with a parang ^^, haha.

That is all for today now then, see ya next time ^^

Wish you all the best =P

By:
Teng Yann Guan 0701652