This thesis is an exploration on the growth and profitability models of Internet enterprises. Via literature review and interview with experts ,we try to answer the following questions: 1.What's the vision of Internet? 2.How Internet enterprises expand and grow? 3.How to earn profits? And how to generate the synergy by connecting them with each other? 4.Are there any ways to maintain continuous growth and profitability? From the general influence diagram of Heijden, we could believe that knowledge management is the basis of growth, value chain is the gravity center of development, and continuous innovation is the driver of growth. However, the main actions to make external growth are strategic alliance and M&A, and they are also the fastest ways to expand the scale of business. Furthermore, our research also finds that there are ten profit models with respect to dot com companies. They are (1)Customer Solutions Profit, (2)Value Chain Position Profit , (3)Time Profit , (4)Specialization Profit, (5)Brand Profit , (6)New Product Profit , (7)Switchboard Profit , (8)Blockbuster Profit, (9)Patronize Profit ,and (10)Returns Sharing Model¡C Every dot com company could select 2 or 3 models to manage her business and make profits. For network ecology being continuously changeable, every company could develop suitable profit models according to her management character. Finally, by analyzing that how SOFTBANK CO., a venture capital, expands her Netbatsu kingdom, we conclude that cooperation between dot com companies is the best way to survive and grow stronger.

The intention of the programme was to evaluate Product Development (PD) strategies within the automotive industry and to identify areas in which improvements could be made in PD project performance that would also provide a business opportunity for the author's employer RLE International (RLE). The research is principally concerned with the automotive industry but also has broader applications within similar industries. The research was undertaken via three projects. Project 1 involved a study of the structure, drivers and trends within the automotive industry. The aim was to assess the implications for PD in the automotive industry and identify significant issues where opportunities for improvement existed. The outcome was a portrayal of an industry under extreme competitive pressure and waiting for something to change but without a clear future state. What was apparent was that the competitive pressures, and thus the need to deliver more products without significantly increased resources, were not going to abate in the near future. PD has to 'deliver more with less' but a definition of success and its associated measures in terms of the PD process is difficult to frame. Therefore, the aim of project 2 focused on performance measurement of the PD process by assessing four internationally diverse development projects carried out by the author's employer with four discrete customers. The projects were all different in their content and were carried out in different countries, i.e. USA, Germany, India and Sweden. Whilst customer specific and cultural aspects of the projects differed, the significant issue identified via the research was common across all the projects. Traditional Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of cost, time and scope were used but failed to predict issues in project delivery. The key finding was that if project information did not flow as originally planned then resources were wasted resulting in time and cost over-runs. Project 3 researched alternative solutions to the issue of monitoring information flow and proposes a specific method of indicating the likelihood of success in a project by identifying new PD measurement techniques to be used within the automotive PD process. This new measurement criterion of information flow provides a predictive tool that significantly enhances the project control process. The predictive method of information flow tracking developed is new to the automotive PD profession. It was trialled on an existing project and was shown to identify specific issues with the Work-in-Progress (WIP) not found by traditional project management methods. The resulting indication of issues enabled the organisation's management to have a substantially different insight and understanding of project performance at a given point in time and therefore enabled immediate changes in resource allocation to improve project performance. The implementation of these changes as a result of the adoption of information flow monitoring resulted in significantly improved project KPI performance. The contribution of this new PD management method has the potential to significantly impact the competitiveness of any company involved in the design and development process. Its benefits include improved understanding of project performance indicators, powerful predictive attributes resulting in better utilisation of company resources and reductions in both project costs and lead times.

Submitted by Andrea Silva Vilas Boas (asvilasboas@gmail.com) on 2016-06-21T14:30:10Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Andrea_Vilas_Boas FINAL.pdf: 2245517 bytes, checksum: 2320457b8596efc735be6b1403ae065a (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Ana Luiza Holme (ana.holme@fgv.br) on 2016-06-21T14:32:47Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Andrea_Vilas_Boas FINAL.pdf: 2245517 bytes, checksum: 2320457b8596efc735be6b1403ae065a (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-21T14:35:08Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Andrea_Vilas_Boas FINAL.pdf: 2245517 bytes, checksum: 2320457b8596efc735be6b1403ae065a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-05 / This work intends to identify the relevant changes in the market and what the value realized by customers and cabbies, considering the insertion of the companies providing taxi service in the virtual world by using apps. In order to reach out this goal, we explain the value chain concept, including the virtual value chain and value network, aiming to get the best knowledge of the structure in which the companies of this new environment are based on, as well as we explain the business model concepts and Business Model Canvas. Based on this theoretical foundation, we propose a framework that will allow extract information and, after analyzing them, we identify, through a case study, the relevant changes that have occurred in this market and the value realized by both customers and cabbies. The topic is relevant because this is a significant change in how the companies make relationship with their customers and providers. And because it allows to observe what added value this model has been providing and why, due to this, about 30 thousands cabbies in the existing 35 thousands in São Paulo have opted for using apps, making that one of the companies studied in this work have get to more than 2.5 million of downloads in the whole Brazil. It is expected, through this study, to identify the relevant changes that the apps integration has brought to the users and taxi drivers and provide a framework that can be used as an assistant in the analysis of the value chain and virtual value chain of the market for taxi services and show that this model is not just fading to which we can assign a number of benefits, but also a trend that is redefining the format of the companies in this market. / Este estudo pretende identificar as mudanças relevantes no mercado e qual o valor percebido pelos clientes e taxistas, considerando-se a inserção das empresas prestadoras de serviços de táxis da cidade de São Paulo no mundo virtual, através do uso de aplicativos. Para tanto, explanamos o conceito de cadeia de valor, incluindo cadeia de valor virtual e rede de valor, a fim de um melhor entendimento da estrutura em que se embasam as empresas desse novo ambiente, bem como explicamos os conceitos de modelo de negócio e Business Model Canvas. Com esse embasamento teórico propomos um framework com a finalidade de auxiliar o processo de extração e análise das informações que permitiram identificar as mudanças relevantes que ocorreram nesse mercado e o valor percebido pelos clientes e taxistas, fazendo uso de um estudo de caso. O tema é relevante, por se tratar de uma mudança significativa na forma como as empresas se relacionam com seus clientes e prestadores; e por permitir observar que valor agregado esse modelo tem propiciado, que fez com que cerca de 30 mil taxistas, dos 35 mil da cidade de São Paulo, optassem pelo uso de aplicativos, fazendo com que uma das empresas estudadas nessa dissertação atingisse mais de 2.5 milhões de downloads em todo o Brasil. Espera-se, com este estudo, identificar as mudanças relevantes que a inserção dos aplicativos trouxeram aos usuários e taxistas e apresentar um framework que pode ser utilizado como um facilitador na análise da cadeia de valor e cadeia de valor virtual do mercado de prestação de serviços de taxis, esclarecendo que esse modelo não é apenas um modismo ao qual se pode atribuir uma série de benefícios, mas, sim, uma tendência que está redefinindo o formato das empresas desse mercado.

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how Covid-19 affects international e-commerce firms. Covid-19 has been the source of changes in the international business environment across world from the beginning of year 2020. The effects on e-commerce firms are nearly unknown, therefore this research is unique. The aim of this study is to gain more knowledge on how international e-commerce firms are responding to the pandemic. By following a qualitative research method, the study will explore and conduct a deeper understanding on the e-commerce firms experience through a data collection. The literature review has been established, theories are mostly related to digital business environment and international value chain activities. The literature review has been summed up into a conceptual framework which illustrates the connections between the theories and Covid-19. Furthermore, the conceptual framework has been used to analyze the findings from the empirical data which was conducted in a multi-case study. The analysis chapter discusses similarities differences between the cases and connection to theory. Lastly, the conclusion chapter of this thesis concludes the findings and analysis, and it contains theoretical implications, recommendations, limitations and suggestions for future research.