TABLE 27  Percentage of Efficient Banks in the Sample Per Country 

 Denmark 

France 

Germany 

USA 

Efficient 

38.3 

14.5 23.1 41.3 

Source: CRITO Global E Commerce Survey, 2002; unweighted sample.

Aside from the impact on the efficiency of banks within the sample, e commerce may also be 

used to achieve and have an impact on strategic goals. According to a model developed by Ken 

Kraemer (Kraemer et al., 1999), firms are asked about the impact and usage of e commerce in 

two different ways: the impact on internal process optimization (operational focus) and external 

market penetration (market focus). The results for the efficient banks of the sample are provided 

in Figure 29. While 74% of Danish banks regard e commerce as having a great deal of impact 

for both foci, only 4% use e commerce without a specific focus. Only 47% of German banks 

follow a dual focus when implementing e commerce solutions, with approximately 13% of them 

invested strategically without focal attention. 

FIGURE 29  The Strategic Orientation of Financial Institutions 

High

Operations Focus

Dual Focus

DEN

FRA

DEN

FRA

13%

11%

74%

56%

GER

USA

GER

USA

13%

18%

47%

45%

Internal

Unfocused

Market Focus

DEN

FRA

DEN

FRA

4%

11%

9%

22%

GER

USA

GER

USA

13%

16%

27%

21%

Low

Low

External

High

Source: CRITO Global E Commerce Survey, 2002;  unweighted sample.

Impact on the finance industry 

Many banks are dealing with the challenge of decentralized systems, data redundancies, and non 

standardized applications across non integrated platforms, especially after the M&A wave of the 

last decade. Forthcoming investments will have to be carried out in the area of intra group and 

multi channel integration. Moreover, being information intensive organizations with complex 

information systems, banks will have to continue investing in IT upgrading. Enhancing process 

63