E-Business System Report for Apple Inc.

E-Business System Report for Apple Inc.

Introduction

The company that I have chosen for this assignment is Apple Inc. Apple Inc. is a multinational firm of United States of America. The company's headquarters is located in Cupertino, California. Apple Inc. is famous for designing, developing and selling personal computers, computer software and consumer electronics. The most famous hardware products of Apple Inc. include the iPhone, the iPod, the iPad and the Mac line of computers (Linzmayer, 1999). The software of Apple Inc. includes the iOS operating systems and the OS X, the Safari browser, the iTunes media browser and the iWork and iLife production and creativity suites. Apple Inc. was founded in 1977 and has become one of the largest technology companies in terms of the revenue generated. Apple Inc. has a total of 394 stores in different countries and has over 72,800 full time permanent employees.

Discussion

Information Resources

Apple Inc. is well known for the best usage of its employees and people. The employees of Apple Inc. include people from management to the lower staff. They also include the technologists who are the backbone of the company. Since Apple Inc. is a technology company, the use of hardware, software, data, information and network is of considerable importance. The company has been making, as well as, using the hardware and software in their daily routine activities. The information comes in from different sources like suppliers, retailers, as well as, the customers. This information, as well as, the information systems is of prime importance for a company like Apple Inc.

Role of Information Systems

Information systems are of prime importance in Apple Inc. They are used for analyzing, as well as, storing information. These systems are also used by the company to integrate information from within and outside the company. This is helpful in staying up to date with the internal performances and the external opportunities and threats (Heijden, 2009). They are also helpful in taking decisions. They provide the company knowledge about the quality and adequacy if their policies and actions. They assist the company in the routine business processes which are necessary for achieving the corporate objectives.

Porter's five forces model is of extreme importance for any business. Apple Inc. also makes use of the five forces identified by Porter. The five forces are Threat of new entrants, bargaining power of buyers, Substitute products & services, bargaining power of the ...