Many people view the term "electronic commerce" (or e-commerce) as shopping on the part of the Internet called the (71).However, electronic commerce also covers many other activities, such as businesses trading with other business and internal processes that companies use to support the buying, selling, hiring, planning and other activities. Some people use the term electronic business (or e-business) when they are talking about electronic commerce in this broader sense. For example, IBM defines electronic business as *the transformation of key business process through the use of Internet technologies." Most people use the terms “electronic commerce” and“(72)” interchangeably. Herein, the term electronic commerce is used in its broadest sense and includes all business activities using (73) Some people categorize electronic commerce by types of entities participating in the transactions or business processes. The five general electronic commerce categories are business -to-consumer, business-to-business, business processes, consumer-to-consumer, and business-to-government, among which the following three are most commonly used: (1)Consumer shopping on the Web, often called business-to-consumer (or B2C) (2)Transactions conducted between businesses on the Web, often called business-to-business (or B2B) (3)Transactions and (74) in which companies, governments, and other organizations use Internet technologies to support selling and purchasing activities. To understand these categories better, consider a company that manufactures stereo speakers. The company might sell its finished product to consumers on the Web, which would be B2C electronic commerce. It might also purchase the materials it uses to make the speakers from other companies on the Web, which would be B2B electronic commerce. Businesses often have entire departments devoted to negotiating purchase transactions with their suppliers. These departments are usually named supply management or procurement. Thus, B2B electronic commerce is sometimes called (75).
