Austria
IT Usage by Businesses: Electronic Commerce & E-Business
Executive Summary
The business and
government sectors lead the way for technology diffusion in the general
population. Disturbingly, there were only a little more than a million PC units
in business or government offices in 2001. 94 percent of enterprises have
Internet access, attesting to the importance of the Internet in a global
economy.
Source:
Statistik Austria, 2004
This section
discusses ICT diffusion and rates of usage by businesses, which were evaluated
with regard to e-commerce and e-business.
E-Business
The Austrian government is concerned about promoting ICT in businesses. In order to improve in this area, the Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs and Labour launched the e-Business in a New Economy in 2000. This initiative concentrates on an Action Plan of six activities:
|
Activity |
Examples of Projects |
|
Information
and Awareness |
"eBiz"
communication platform, multimedia and "eBiz" awards |
|
Creation
and Growth of Businesses |
Contact point for
start-ups, which provides infrastructure, advice, information on venture
capital |
|
Research
and Development |
Kind and Knet
Competence Centres, competition for R&D projects |
|
e-Content
Austria |
Promotional activities for
the content industry |
|
Innovation
through e-Business |
Technology transfer to
SMEs, eBusiness for clusters |
|
e-Location
Austria |
|
|
Source: IT Outlook 2002
Recent Developments in Austrian IT Policies |
|
The Ministry has budgeted approximately EUR 22 million (ATS 300 million) for this initiative (16). The Austrian Federal Economic Chamber (WKÖ), the regional (Länder) governments and regional development and technology centers join the Ministry in this effort.
Electronic Commerce
An important factor in business is the e-commerce platform. E-commerce encompasses the business-to-business and business-to-customer transactions. The World Bank Group expands this traditional definition to include government-to-citizens (G2C), government-to-business enterprises (G2B), and inter-agency (G2G) transactions.
Although the Internet has been well received, e-commerce has been slow to take off in Austria. Security is the primary deterrent but the slow economy has also been a factor (9). In 2000, approximately fifty percent of billing inquiries in Austria to the UK credit-card company, Europay, were from customers inquiring the amount billed after purchasing items on the Internet or denied making the purchase at all. In that year, only one percent of Austrian users regularly purchased items on the Internet.
The Austrian government and commercial businesses have been active in changing this trend. Pre-paid cards are available to make small purchases online. For larger purchases, bill-presenting systems (i.e. Bezahlen.at an electronic transaction service) are available free of charge to retail customers (EUR 0.58 per invoice for the participating e-commerce organizations). After the purchase, the organizations send an invoice to the bank’s web server who then notifies the customer via email. The customer views the invoice online and, once approved, it is sent to the bank for settlement. As of 2002, 22 private and public firms, 15 local governments, 23 non-profit organizations, and 4 e-shops were participating. Since April 2001, all public dues owed to the Federal Ministry of Finance can be settled through Bezahlen.at.
The government has also established a website, Internet Ombudsman (www.ombudsmann.at), to assist online consumers with advice or with legal means to register a grievance. This site is operated by the Austrian Consumer’s Association with the assistance of the Austrian Institute for Applied Telecommunication and funded by the European Commission’s Health and Consumer Protection-Directorate General.
Austria passed the E-commerce Law in 2001 to increase the protection of online customers. The goals of the regulations are to increase transparency in the process and to encourage consumer confidence in e-commerce. For instance, it requires any company engaging in e-commerce to publish its contact information on the website, as well as the contact information for any government authority monitoring its activities. KommAustria is the supervisory body of e-commerce in Austria.
One of the areas where future high growth rates are still predicted is in B2B commerce. The automotive industry, an important industrial sector in Austria, can benefit greatly from adopting a B2B platform. Austria’s Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs and Labour launched the Triple A project for this purpose. The project emphasizes the need for cooperation of businesses to improve competitiveness, much like a business cluster. Among others, the project provides a central entrance to e-commerce for firms in the automotive sector. Costs for the project and the first year of operation were approximately EUR 3.63 million (ATS 50 million) and was financed through the Federal Ministry of Economic Affairs and Labour and the regional (Länder) governments of Upper Austria and Styria (16).
Below are the overall values of e-commerce in 2002. The table endorses the overwhelming importance of business-to-business transactions in all countries. It also highlights Austria’s weakness in the area of business-to-consumer transactions.
|
|
Austria |
Switzerland |
Germany |
|
B2C e-commerce, 2002 |
805,550,289 |
1,125,506,078 |
8,458,448,757 |
|
Value in US Dollars |
|||
|
|
|||
|
B2B e-commerce, 2002 |
5,522,590,911 |
8,786,150,296 |
69,912,466,926 |
|
Value in US Dollars |
|||
|
Source: The Global Information Technology Report 2003-2004 |
|
||
Economist Intelligence Unit: “E-readiness” Rankings
In 2002, The Economist Intelligence Unit ranked the sixty largest markets in the world in "E-readiness.” E-readiness expresses “the extent to which a country’s business environment is conducive to Internet-based commercial opportunities” (9). Some of the factors included in the analysis are telephone penetration, online security, and IP protection. Governments heavily promote strong rankings in surveys such as this one and the The Global Information Technology Report 2003-2004 to attract companies interested in investing outside of their home. The following table shows the rankings of the top 14 out of sixty. Austria is 14th on the list and received a score of 8.1 (score 1-10).
|
E-readiness Rankings, 2002 |
|||
|
2002 Ranking (of 60) |
2001 Ranking |
Country |
E-readiness score (of 10) |
|
1 |
1 |
United States |
8.41 |
|
2 |
10 |
Netherlands |
8.4 |
|
3 |
3 |
United Kingdom |
8.38 |
|
4 (tie) |
11 |
Switzerland |
8.32 |
|
4 (tie) |
6 |
Sweden |
8.32 |
|
6 |
2 |
Australia |
8.3 |
|
7 |
9 |
Denmark |
8.29 |
|
8 |
12 |
Germany |
8.25 |
|
9 |
4 |
Canada |
8.23 |
|
10 |
8 |
Finland |
8.18 |
|
11 (tie) |
7 |
Singapore |
8.17 |
|
11 (tie) |
5 |
Norway |
8.17 |
|
13 |
13 |
Hong Kong |
8.13 |
|
14 |
16 |
Austria |
8.1 |