Information Systems in E-Business and Online Commerce

URL study guide

https://studiegids.vu.nl/en/courses/2024-2025/E_MFEO_ISEOC

Course Objective

ACADEMIC SKILLS: Develop the ability to understand and critically examine technological developments as they relate to the domain of e-business and online commerce. Students should be able to:understand and critically reflect on the role of information systems and technology in facilitating e-business, online commerce, and social commerce;examine the relationship between technological developments and e-business and online commerce. KNOWLEDGE: Acquire a fundamental understanding of information systems usage in the context of e-business and online commerce, and the main technological trends and issues that permeate it. More specifically, students will gain knowledge concerning the following:the information systems landscape of e-business and online commerce organizations;important technological and infrastructural developments such as application programming interfaces (APIs), cloud and serverless computing, digital platforms, no-code and low-code platforms, and service-oriented architectures, and how they relate to e-business and online commerce; the challenges that changing trends in e-business and online commerce pose for the information systems landscape of and technology in use at the organization BRIDGING THEORY AND PRACTICE: Apply received knowledge to business problems at hand. Specifically:apply theoretical knowledge relating to information systems to the practice of conducting business online;conceive of and develop applications using no-code or low-code platforms;translate business needs to technological solutions and vice versa. SOCIAL SKILLS: Be able to effectively work in project teams on business problems and communicate on project results both through presentation and writing.

Course Content

Information systems and technology lie at the very heart of e-business and online commerce. Innovations in those technologies have made it possible to conduct business over the Internet, through mobile apps, and via social media platforms. Technology also enables streamlining interactions with suppliers, business partners, and customers, and collecting and analyzing data from digital transactions to predict what customers might be interested in. At the same time, conceived business innovations in e-business and online commerce activities often also have to be supported by new technology. It is on this nexus between business and technology needs that this course resides, as it addresses the fundamental role of information systems and technology in e-business and online commerce. Our focus is on recent technological developments such as application programming interfaces (APIs), cloud and serverless computing, digital platforms, no-code and low-code platforms, service-oriented architectures, and others. Students will develop an essential understanding of these technological developments as well as what new business activities they enable and how they are applied. Moreover, students will consider the challenges that come with these technological developments and conducting business over the Internet more generally. Students will apply their acquired knowledge through their work on developing an app to solve a business problem. In groups, students will use a low-code platform, Mendix, to develop their own application and reflect on the design choices that they have made. This way, students gain first-hand experience of the challenges that arise when aligning business and technology. While working with Mendix, students have the opportunity to obtain formal certification as a Mendix Rapid Application Developer as a natural extension of the coursework.

Teaching Methods

Lectures Knowledge clips Tech Q&As Tutorials

Method of Assessment

Final exam
- Individual assessment Low-code app assignment
- Group assessment

Literature

The readings for this course consist of a collection of academic and practitioner-oriented papers. The (links to) those papers will be distributed via Canvas.

Target Audience

This course is part of the minor in E-Business and Online Commerce, but the course is open to other students as well.

Recommended background knowledge

Although there are no formal entry requirements for this course, it is important to note that we build on the knowledge that students gained during an introductory course on Information Systems, such as Business Information Systems or Business Information Technology.