The Research

Thailand has its own unique culture and religion, as well as a low level of English literacy. The authors believe that these factors are of equal importance to determining the successful adoption of e-business as are the eight key factors identified by Western researchers.

The Hypothesis

The eight key factors identified by Western researchers are based on findings relating to the Western model of businessWestern. Thailand, like other countries in Asia, has its own unique educational system, culture, religion and social framework. Education, society and culture (including business culture) may have therefore a strong influence on the adoption of e-business and e-business activities in Thailand.

The Objectives

The main objective of this research is to validate the above hypothesis. The other major objective of the research is to attempt to establish the following in relation to Thailand:

  • The current status of e-business

  • The reasons for businesses to start e-business initiatives

  • Cultural factors and their relative importance

  • The main difficulties in driving e-business initiatives

The findings from this research will lay the foundation for future research aimed at developing a holistic framework to guide e-business development in Thailand. The frame-work will assist countries in a similar developmental state to successfully implement new endeavors and support the next generation of e-business environments.

The Method

One hundred Thai businesses in the Bangkok region were randomly selected to participate in the study. Forty companies finally agreed to participate. An executive was selected from each company and interviewed either face-to-face, over the phone, or through the mail.

The Survey Population

Of the 40 companies who agreed to participate, more than half were small-and mediumsized enterprises (SMEs). SME are defined as companies with less than 50 employees. Around 20 percent can be considered to be large firms (with more than 500 employees (see Figure 1). Around 50 percent of the companies had less than 10 IT staff (see Figure 2).


Figure 1: Number of employees


Figure 2: Number of IT

The majority (60 percent) of the companies surveyed were traditional companies involved in manufacturing, retail, wholesale, financial services, travel, communication/ information and government service. The remaining 40 percent were in the Information Technology (IT) sector (see Figure 3).


Figure 3: Industry sectors of the surveyed company

General Findings

All the senior executives agreed with the definition of e-business (as defined earlier in this chapter). All the executives interviewed agreed that e-business in Thailand was still in its early stages; though most believed that e-business was here to stay. They agreed that e-business would increase competition.

The survey showed that approximately 56 percent of the organizations had short and long-term plans for e-business. The remainder had no immediate plans to introduce e-business activities. The executives felt that there was little encouragement from the Thai Government in the form of support for private sector e-business activities.

Table 1 shows the survey results relating to the reasons for adopting e-business. The top three reasons for Thai organizations to introduce e-business initiatives were market expansion (33.3 percent); gaining advantage over competitors (16.7 percent); and real-time response to meet customer demand (11.1 percent).

Table 1: E-business initiatives reasons

Market expansion - Advertisement

33.3%

Competition

16.7%

Real-time response to meet the customer demand

11.1%

Company's image

5.6%

Cost efficiency

5.6%

Increased profitability

5.6%

Information fulfillment

5.6%

Internet requirement from end users

5.6%

Catching up with technology

5.6%

Common Practice

5.6%

Specific Findings

Issues Associated with E-Business in Thailand

Table 2 displays those e-business issues identified by the executives of the surveyed companies as being of most importance. The survey revealed that education and culture were the main issues for e-business activities in Thailand. This finding agrees with the hypothesis stated earlier.

Table 2: E-business issues

Education & Culture

28.57%

Payment Processes (Banking Practice including secure transaction)

23.81%

Law (Legal and regulations)

19.05%

Infrastructure (Accessibility to Computer & regional differences)

9.52%

Infrastructure (Telecommunication & Technology)

9.52%

Infrastructure (Delivery Systems)

4.76%

Government Support

4.76%

The survey also indicates that Thai executives believed e-business technology in Thailand would eventually catch up with the rest of the world. They expressed a strong desire for further research in education and culture in relation to e-business activities.

Cultural Factors that Effect E-Business Activities in Thailand

During the survey, all executives were asked to list the social and cultural factors that they believed related to e-business activities in Thailand. Twenty factors were identified. Table 3 shows the survey findings which revealed that business culture and Web page presentation were considered by the Thai executives to be the main factors determining the success of Thai e-business initiatives. They agreed that developers of e-business applications had to respect cultural factors.

Table 3: Culture factors

Business Culture (After Sale Services, Warranty, Refund Policy, Information Secrecy)

12.37%

Web page Presentation (Color, Format, Layout, Font)

10.31%

Price (Including Credit Card & Delivery Charge)

9.28%

Payment (Including Credit Card, Banking systems)

6.19%

Response Time

6.19%

Trust & Sincerity

6.19%

Web pages Contents

6.19%

Government Support

5.15%

Security

5.15%

Company's Image (Including Creditability, Location, Product Brand)

4.12%

Convenience

4.12%

Education

4.12%

Product Category (Variety)

4.12%

Cross Culture

3.09%

Delivery

3.09%

Languages

3.09%

Laws (Including Copyright)

3.09%

Technological Apprehension

2.06%

Fashion

1.03%

Web pages Address (Easy to remember)

1.03%

Comments on the Identified Culture Factors

As expected, business culture heads the list of cultural influences. Thai businesses often do not have refund policies; have unique warranty and information secrecy policies; and often have poor after-sale service in comparison to Western companies. Factors relating to credit cards and banking systems appear high on the list (third and fourth positions) and the authors believe that this is directly related to the issue of trust (the sixth position on the list).

Impact of Cultural Factors - Fonts, Color and Diagrams

Web page presentation occupies a high position on the list of cultural influences.

Graphical components on a web page are there to support users' understanding of the product and thereby encourage them to purchase from the company. Graphics, such as charts, diagrams and illustrations, need the support of text and color. The letters of the alphabet and numbers can be presented using various typeface styles. Each typeface style is designed to cater for different requirements. Some are created for legibility and to be easy on the eyes. Some styles are created to make use of space efficiently. Colors have the power and ability to influence emotions, perceptions and moods. They can alter behavior and trigger different emotional responses. Kang and Corbitt (2001) suggested that web page designers maximize the benefit of using colors, symbols and graphics on the web page.

Kang and Corbitt (2001) also stated that color and screen design directions have dissimilar psychological and social associations in different cultures. Users with different cultural backgrounds have different concepts of screen usage. E-business is a global business and therefore, users can be from a wide variety of different cultural backgrounds. The use of particular fonts, colors and diagrams in web page presentation can express the national identity and business culture of an organization.

Below are examples of how fonts, colors and diagrams were used to illustrate national and business culture in a web-based e-business application. Various web page presentations from the Makro Asia company chain, which operates in various different countries, were used. Makro Asia is a distributor for food and non-food products in the Asian region.

Figure 4 is a screen capture of the "Siam makro" retailer Web page application. It was designed for local Thai consumers using Thai cultural and social contexts. The lady performs the traditional Thai greeting Wai. Wai is a way of saying hello and of showing thanks or respect for people. In this case, it means, "Welcome." The smile is used to express friendliness. The background color is used to create an atmosphere of warmth. Text fonts used are in the Thai language.


Figure 4: Thai local firms - makro

click to expand
Figure 5: Mackro in Taiwan

In contrast, the Web pages designed by the same company for Taiwan, the Philippines and Indonesia are different to those of Thailand. As shown in the diagram below, there are clearly cultural issues involved. Although different fonts, color and diagrams are used, these Web pages still identify the "makro" company chain.

E-Business Language Support

Language as a factor was rated surprisingly low. This may be because English remains the main language of e-business Web pages in Thailand (Table 4). The authors believe that this ranking was influenced by the survey being conducted from the executive view-point. As most of the Thai population has a poor command of the English language, it is believed that interviewing a broader cross-section of the Thai populace would have resulted in a higher ranking for this cultural factor.

Table 4: Language used in Thai web pages

English

47.06%

Thai

29.41%

Others: Malaysian, Chinese, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish

29.41%

Badre (2000) identified 168 native-languages used to build web pages around the world. According to Global Internet Statistics (by Language), as of March 2002, there were approximately 561 million people online. Of this number, 40.2 percent spoke English, while 26.1 percent of non-English speakers spoke Asian languages (Global Reach, 2002). For any business to extend beyond its national boundaries, language is an essential and often difficult obstacle to overcome.


Figure 6: Makro in Philippine

click to expand
Figure 7: Makro in Indonesia

E-Business Security

Security is always a big concern with Internet technologies (Biscontri, 2001). The survey revealed that security was ranked reasonably high on the list. Surprisingly, most Thai executives surveyed claimed that their current e-business activities were secure, even though 37 percent of those being asked the question were not clear how the security of their Web sites was being achieved.

Cross Culture

The survey revealed that the majority (67 percent) of Thai executives agreed that cultural issues had a strong impact on running e-business activities. This finding supports the findings by Fleenor and Raven (2002), which stated that culture and sensitivity to cultural differences plays a critical role in successful international business and international e-business. Understanding how the Web page fits into a country's culture is necessary to forming successful customer relations.

The survey also revealed that Thai executives believe as businesses go online, cross-cultural issues become more important. The position of Thailand in the early adoption stages of e-business explains the current position of cross-cultural issues towards the bottom of the list.

The Main Difficulties Encountered in Driving E-Business Initiatives

The survey indicates that the main barrier to driving e-business initiatives in Thailand came from internal constraints (45 percent) of which 20 percent is accounted for by organizational infrastructure (see Table 5). This finding comes as no surprise, as most of the companies surveyed operate as family-run entities in which the owner is the sole decision-maker for the organization. A common cultural feature shared by many Thai business executives is that if something is operating, regardless of its level of efficiency, it should not be tampered with.

Table 5: E-business initiatives barriers

Internal Factors

45%

Organization infrastructure

20%

Employees

10%

Web pages development

10%

Capital Investment

5%

External Factors

35%

Education - including English literacy

15%

Communication Infrastructure - including online payment

10%

Customer

10%

No difficulties

20%

Table 5 indicates that of the external influences on Thai e-business, education and English literacy also play an important role (15 percent of total). English and education, especially computer literacy, were the main concerns shared by Thai executives.



Managing Globally with Information Technology
Managing Globally with Information Technology
ISBN: 193177742X
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2002
Pages: 224

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