In the past ten years, technology in business has exploded to astronomical proportions. While there are security vulnerabilities through dependence on technology, many companies are switching toward technologically oriented solutions in their marketplace due to overwhelming advantages in efficiency, productivity, and scalability.
The twentieth century was a booming technological decade. Thousands of multimillion dollar companies sprouted, offering corporations choices to thrive and expand. Many companies began investing heavily in technologies such as CRM (Customer Relationship Management) applications, which help organize a company’s prospects and clientele. The CRM industry is estimated to reach $2.8 billion in yearly revenue by the year 2006, mostly distributed across three leading companies: SAP, Seibel, and SalesForce. Every industry from doctor’s offices to automobile manufactures need to maintain a form of internal organization, and they are beginning to move from paper and filing cabinets toward a more flexible digital solution.
Ten years ago, before companies such as Seibel were founded, almost all organization was done manually. Every contact was in an address book and every record was in a file. Since then, many companies have sought after the high ROI (Return on Investments) that technology brings. If a client called a support center with a question on the product they ordered, the representative had no way of tracking the package or seeing the status of the shipment. Today nearly every enterprise level company in existence has programs to track tickets and merchandise through their infrastructure. This greatly boosts the customer’s satisfaction and improves the chances of repeat business- thus the technology having an excellent ROI.
While the good greatly outweighs the evil of utilizing technology in businesses, the evils do exist. By maintaining all records and information in a digital form, companies often allow accessibility from remote locations, such as sharing client information between different offices. This is great for scaling businesses, but opens a new danger for illegal intrusion and hacking. On February 13th, 2003, a computer hacker broke into Data Processors International, a large merchant credit card handling company, and gained access to over 80 million credit cards. The Secret Services and FBI spent two weeks tracking down the hacker costing millions of dollars. Another large problem occurred in keeping digital records is the constant threat of a virus. One malicious program unleashed on the server could potentially cause billions of dollars in data loss. These are the occurrences heard about in news broadcasts about once every few months. While proper security and server maintenance can prevent such catastrophes, the threat exists- a threat non-existent in hard copy control.
Business technology extends beyond computer software programs and into robotics. Upon entering a doctor’s office, patients are surrounded by technology from x-ray machines to heart monitors- high level technology that didn’t exist ten years ago. This technology allows doctors to more accurately diagnose the problem in less time, allowing the offices to handle more patients per day, and turning out more satisfied people. The investment in this equipment was quickly reimbursed through a greater flow of people through the office.
Technology is a necessity in the modern world- existing everywhere, driving everything. It automates the most tedious task and facilitates the most difficult calculations. Every single enterprise level company, without exception, drives an infrastructure powered by technology. In today’s civilization, technology is a necessity to corporate success.
