What is a Business Eco System?
The goal of a business is to generate capital appreciation and profits for its owners or stakeholders by engaging in provision of goods and services to customers within the eco system/framework governed by respective laws(local/international). The eco system involves various entities that the business works with for delivery of a product or service.
The goal of a business is to generate capital appreciation and profits for its owners or stakeholders by engaging in provision of goods and services to customers within the eco system/framework governed by respective laws(local/international). The eco system involves various entities that the business works with for delivery of a product or service. Suppliers, Employees, Employee unions, Trade bodies, Government agencies, Customers, Competitors are some of the organizations in the eco system involved in delivery of goods or services.
Modern business organizations run multiple product and service lines, operate globally, leverage large number of registered legal entities, and operate through complex matrix relationships. To stay competitive in the current global business environment, they must often develop highly diverse and complex organizational structures that cross international borders.
These complexities create need for advanced operational and supporting business processes to drive organization wide effectiveness, efficiency and achieve business objectives. This forces companies to create a diverse array of subsidiaries, legal entities, organizations, and accounting processes to ensure a smooth and profitable business flow. Tax considerations also impact how businesses construct these complex legal structures.
In this section we will explore the different legal and operational structures that are commonly adopted by these global conglomerates.
Importance of Business Eco System
A single business can never serve the needs of a customer unless it engages and works with the other entities in the eco system. For example, to manufacture a product there is a need for certain raw materials, some of which must be processed before they can be used in production and hence the need for suppliers. The Government creates the basic infrastructure like roads, ports, governing policies and procedures, trade agreements with other countries, basic research and development facilities, labor laws that will help businesses in setting up and running their operations. Hence a business engaging in manufacturing needs Suppliers, Government and other entities.
So, the business eco systems helps with
- Leveraging capabilities (production, purchase, engineering skills etc.) beyond the capability of a single entity
- Innovation from one party that helps in adding value to the overall process by cutting production cost or time or improving customer experience
- There is constant interaction between the parties resulting in exchange of ideas, learnings
James Moore, a business strategist wrote in a 1993 Harvard Business Review:
“In a business ecosystem, companies co-evolve capabilities around a new innovation: They work cooperatively and competitively to support new products, satisfy customer needs, and eventually incorporate the next round of innovations.”
Internally, an organization can be structured in many different ways, depending on their objectives. The internal structure of an organization will determine the modes in which it operates and performs. Organizational structure allows the expressed allocation of responsibilities for different functions and processes to different entities such as the branch, department, workgroup and individual.
We know that big multinational organizations operate in a matrix environment, constitute of many units and need different views of their operating and financial results. These different views may represent financials or profitability by geographies, countries, locations, businesses, segments, product lines, cost centers, functions, COE’s etc.
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