International major in E-business

Presentation (download official presentation, PDF format)

Companies throughout the world exchange information via the Internet and do business thanks to the Internet. The Internet is thus becoming the driving force in the development of the activities of numerous companies. It is also a tool in the creation of new fields of activity and new companies.

E-business take advantage from the Internet in order to associate the clients, the salespeople, the suppliers and the employees in a completely new type of structure. It travels from private intranets to shared extranets using the public Internet network.

E-business comes from the association of the vast domain which makes up the Internet and the enormous resources of classical information systems. It adapts the central processes of the company in order to improve the client service, to reduce the length of operational cycles, to obtain better results from limited resources and to produce sales.

Objectives of the major

The objectives of this curriculum are to allow students to :

• understand e-business stakes and objectives for a company,

• describe business models and create a business plan,

• manage an e-business project in an international context.

Pre-requiste

Students wishing to follow this course should have knowledge of basic management skills, for example:marketing, accounting, strategy, human resources management,

Fundamental organization of the major

The major is made up of around 300 hours of classes, followed by 100 hours of project work to apply in practice the knowledge gained. The course is divided into three main parts:

• Discovering the e-business myths and reality
• Understanding the main stakes
• Managing e-business projects

Teaching methods

The teaching is directed at creating situations which correspond to actual working conditions:

• Team work with oral and written restitution,
• Carrying out of a project representing the equivalent of 100 hours for a company,
• Parts of the course will be complemented by an operational approach, so as to develop operational expertise (these two parts involve many actual case studies or micro-projects, supervised by professionals working in the sector).

Many professionals from the economic sectors concerned will take part in the option, on the basis of a structured teaching concept which emphasises expertise and knowledge of proven effectiveness. The course will draw a clear distinction between concepts and tools, the former being of more lasting importance.

The professorial staff will take care to ensure that the point of the classes is clearly understood (value, ultimate purpose, positioning). Students will have to "learn how it is done" and develop the right reflexes for each situation.