Internet Strategy: The Road to Web Services Solutions

Citation

du Preez, M. (2006), "Internet Strategy: The Road to Web Services Solutions", Online Information Review, Vol. 30 No. 3, pp. 319-320. https://doi.org/10.1108/14684520610675898

Matthew Guah, a researcher, and Wendy Currie, a professor in business information systems at the Warwick Business School, address business issues and management concerns that relate to internet strategies of organisations in their new book. In this book they try to advise businesses on how to manage emerging technologies, such as web services resources and strategies, to ensure they remain competitive.

The criteria explored by Guah and Currie in Internet Strategy are being used as the foundation for some of the best textbooks on information systems. These include internet strategies and management concepts, the business and economics of information systems environments, opportunities and information about application service provision (ASP) and web services, and sociological aspects of web services buyer behaviour.

A brief technology review, a reflection on the information society and an examination of internet strategy follow the introduction. The book is then divided into three sections offering a good balance between theory, practice and a reflection on the future of web services business models. In Section 1 the authors point out that the web services business model was borne out of the ASP business model. Chapters 1 and 2 define the ASPs phenomenon, details the issues surrounding its emergence as an internet strategic model and details how web services could potentially make a significant difference in the integration of software applications across multiple platforms, sites and departments of an organisation. Chapter 3 focuses on ASP concerns, while Chapter 4 suggests some ways to approach the web services business model.

Six case studies make up Section 2, where readers can look at different forms of web service applications. These involve implementation issues from active researchers in both Europe and Asia. Section 3 examines the problem of how the business environment can redefine success in the twenty‐first century. The final chapter also recaps the strategic direction of internet‐based business models and reiterates a few implications for an organisation's decision to invest in web services.

The many examples that appear throughout the text of Internet Strategy have been drawn from international business areas to “describe some interesting work … while maintaining the role of theory and case studies within the interpretive traditions of internet service research”. Internet Strategy successfully combines theory and practice in its aim to disclose the motives and mechanisms of web services as they are developing and changing in the twenty‐first century. The volume includes bibliographies at the end of each chapter, an extensive glossary and a useful index.

IT managers, information systems strategists and business operations managers will find the book most useful, since it successfully balances system theory and proven internet management frameworks; explains the strategic management of internet policies; and provides a guide to the successful application of ASP and web services within an organisation.