E-collaboration: A Universal Key to Solve Fierce Competition in Tourism Industry?

Abstract

E-collaboration is a new strategy to compete in today's business world. Cooperation, collaboration, alliance and etc are the words companies are now focusing on. These companies are looking towards friendliness instead of hostility. This paper analyzes the previous literature on Internet, e-business, and collaboration, looking at the emergency of e-collaboration in the tourism industry. The applications of e-collaboration are often mentioned in the fields of international trading and e-business. The paper aims to apply those theories of collaboration, internet and e-business from other industries to tourism and hospitality industry. It also analyzes the e-collaboration situation in this particular area and tries to find a way to help today's tourism industry players to create and guide thriving e-collaboration strategies. E-collaboration provides a very efficient strategic option with low cost, easy access, large market, reputation and resources sharing. It brings geographically dispersed teams together, supporting communication, coordination and cooperation. But problems like unbalanced management and power between collaborators, unequal resource commitments, quality maintenance, culture differences exist in e-collaboration. In the end of the paper, the author highlights the advantages of e-collaboration and suggests the way to e-collaborate properly to contribute to strategic management.

Encouraging SME eCollaboration – The Role of the Champion Facilitator

“…eCollaboration provides participants clear market advantages. A commonality of information exchange enables an expedient path of communication that establishes a sense of exclusivity to only those members with collaborative access (Ma, 2009). Seamless knowledge management and storage is also achieved (Meixner & Haas, 2008).…”

“…Firms will differ in their levels of technological acceptance. These differences can lead to inequities, where the more technologically capable firm could take advantage of their weaker counterparts (Jones & Burgess, 2009a;Ma, 2009). The virtual advantages of eCollaboration may also become a substitute for a physical presence.…”

“…Firms are able to engage in value creation through enhanced inter-partner learning and by "combining internal and external resources in innovative ways" (Ma, 2009, p. 68). Shared information systems also enable firms to optimize supply chains, reduce inventory costs and risks, improve customer service, and better manage forecasting and planning (Ma, 2009). Some of the problems related to intercultural conflict that are common with conventional forms of collaboration may be avoided through a greater reliance on the virtual environment associated with eCollaboration (Stern & Hicks, 2000).…”

“…As a result, collaborating teams are perceived as being only as good as the worst information management and communication system amongst the partners. For example, the quality of a partner's poor internet site may reflect across the whole group of collaborators (Ma, 2009). eCollaboration has the potential to contribute to business success.…”

Hotel Overbooking and Cooperation with Third-Party Websites

“…Third-party websites also allow control for customers in the selection process and provide convenience. Therefore, hotels should cooperate with third-party websites to widen the market and enhance their competitive position, thereby ensuring their sustainable development [23,24].…”