Browsing by Author "John, Varughese Kizhakkacharuvil"
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    E-business : Growth and Trends in Thailand
    (AU-eJIR, 2017) John, Varughese Kizhakkacharuvil ; Nithiphong Vikitset ; Duangta Duangekanog ; Asawin Wichayachakorn
    The era of e-business has changed the old economic relationship among producers, traders and consumers and the new economic relationship is called extended or integrated relationship. In this context this article has made an enquiry about the growth of e-business in Thailand. The change in technologies has a great impact on the old business models especially in the areas of strategies and customer engagement of business. The platform for changes in e-business is the internet, social media and mobile technology. Majority of the people in Thailand are found to be accustomed in using mobile technology in recent years. Nevertheless, the growth of e-business in the form of B2B, B2C, and G2B/C transactions are not so admirable in Thailand from the analysis and findings of this study during the period of 2012 to 2016.
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    eLearning Adoption and eLearning Satisfaction of Learners: A case study of Management Program in a University of Thailand
    ( 2018-01-25) John, Varughese Kizhakkacharuvil ; Duangta Duangekanong
    This study investigates eLearning mode of learning in Master of Science in Management (MSM) program at a University in Thailand. The School has adopted the open source software ‘MOODLE’ for its engine of Learning Management System (LMS) by customizing it with video and interactive features, since its inception in 2004. This study is based on the basic proposition that Learners’ adoption of e-learning dependent on its effectiveness and usefulness, and their perceived satisfaction. The theoretical foundation of the study has been one of the empirically verified models developed by Shu- Sheng Liaw (2008), labelled as ‘Three-Tier Technology Use Model’ (3-TUM). It consisted of three interlinked tiers in a sequential order, viz., ‘the individual characteristics and/or system quality tier’ (1st tier), ‘the affective and/or cognitive tier’ (2nd tier), and ‘the behavioral intention tier’ (3rd tier). The model has integrated motivation, the self-cognitive theory (SCT), the theory of planned behavior (TPB), and the technology acceptance model (TAM). In this study the researcher has used questionnaire survey method where the sample units are learners who had undergone the program during the period 2007 to 2017 and a total of 270 cases were analyzed and the proposed model was modified and tested through Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). The study concludes that eLearning system quality and perceived self-efficacy of the learners are critical factors determining the behavioral intention to use eLearning as a mode of learning in higher education of Thailand. The study supports certain findings of Liaw (2008) that the considerations for effective eLearning system are Learner’s self-efficacy, Multi-media formats, and the Interaction environment.
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    The Global Competitiveness of Thailand: An Empirical Analysis of the ASEAN Community
    (AU-eJIR, 2017) John, Varughese Kizhakkacharuvil ; Duangta Duangekanog ; Asawin Wichayachakorn ; Nithiphong Vikitset
    The current rate of technological expansion and the globalization of markets have made countries to be more competitive for their economic growth and prosperity. The Global Competitiveness Index (GCI) is a measure computed by the World Economic Forum every year since 1979 on the basis of 12 pillars of economic and human growth indicators. 138 world countries are included in the GCI 2016-17 and these countries accounts for 98% of the world GDP. Thailand is the third major economy among the ASEAN community and it is classified as ‘Efficiency Driven Economy’ according to its score in GCI 2016-17. This study investigates the factors in which Thailand has greater strength and more weakness when compared with the other ASEAN countries based on the GCI indicators. Accordingly Thailand seems to be comparatively weak in Innovation and Institutional factors but strong in Macroeconomic environment factors, Health and Primary Education measures, and in Market Size. The study concludes that if the economic and human development policies are formulated looking into these strengths and weakness, the country can become an ‘Innovation driven economy’ within a short span of time.
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    Impact of Perceived Usefulness on Attitude of members for having Christian Church’s website in Thailand - A Moderated Mediation Model
    (Web Technology eJournal, 2020) Adams, Harold ; John, Varughese Kizhakkacharuvil
    The purpose of the study was to evaluate the online presence of Christian churches in Thailand, and to test the influence of perceived usefulness of Church’s website on the attitude of members to have or improve the website. A sample survey was conducted throughout the Kingdom of Thailand from July 2019 to February 2020 and data were collected from 400 churches without discriminating the online presence or not. Finally, the data set of 177 churches, comprising 335 respondents, having online presence were used for analysis. The theoretical base for the study was the Technology Acceptance Model with its modified version (TAM-2) and the data were tested in a hypothetical model, called, Moderated Mediation Model. The results of analysis showed that model is statistically significant for the data. It has been estimated that 51 to 61 percent of the Christian churches in Thailand did not have any kind online presence and 90 percent of the respondents opined that Church’s website is essential for them and 80 percent demanded for an improvement of the existing website. The effect of moderating variable, perceived ease of use of internet on perceived usefulness, increases as the level raises and that has a significant influence on the mediating variable behavioral intention to use the website. The focal predictor variable ‘Perceived usefulness’ has significant direct influence on the predicted variable ‘Attitude’ at 1 percent level, and, the mediating variable ‘Behavioral intention’ has significant direct influence on the predicted variable ‘Attitude’ at less than 1 percent level.
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    A Panel Data Model on e-Business Development of Nations
    (e-CASE & e-Tech Fall 2017, Seoul, S. Korea, 2017-09-05) John, Varughese Kizhakkacharuvil
    e-Business development has become a key factor for the sustainable economic growth and development of any nation in this new era of digital revolution. This is a macro level study based on the hypothesis that the e-business development of a nation can be predicted on the basis of four independent estimators, namely, 1) Country Characteristics; 2) Business Sophistication; 3) Technological Readiness; and 4) e-Government Support. A panel data of five years (2012-2016) relating to 132 world countries were collected and analyzed. The objective of the study is to develop a panel data regression model (fixed effect) which could test the theoretical foundation that e-business development of a nation could be predicted by the above four estimators. Suitable measurement indicators are collected from reliable sources like IBRD, IMF, WEF, UNCTAD, UN e-Government Report and the Transparency International for the measurement of the variables in the study. The overall functional relationship of the model is proved statistically significant on obtaining a significant F-value at <1% level and also with a high R-square value. All the coefficients are positive and significant at 1% level and hence it is proved that country characteristics, business sophistication, technological readiness, and e-government support have strong positive association to the e-business development of a nation. The growth of e-business, of course, leads to a raise in investment in Information Communication Technology (ICT) which turned out to a raise in productivity and economic growth of a nation. In conclusion, e-Business development of a nation shall be explained as ‘the formation of a culture of innovation, sophistication, discipline, adaptation, and transformation of businesses and society at large’.
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    A study on the Impact of e-Commerce on SMEs in Thailand
    ( 2018-06-26) John, Varughese Kizhakkacharuvil ; Asawin Wichayachakorn ; Nithiphong Vikitset
    Business-to-consumer (B2C) e-Commerce is the focus of this study with special emphasis to its impact on small-and-medium enterprises or SMEs in Thailand. The impact is investigated in two perspectives – the economic impact and the social impact- where the former is concerned to the firms in terms of increase in its profitability and operating efficiency and the latter is related to the society in general imparted by the firm in terms of employment created. The study further investigated the penetration of e-Commerce (B2C) among consumers of Thailand and their perceptions towards online shopping. The retailers of four commodities (books & magazines, cosmetics, mobile, and laptop) and the consumers are the samples of the study. The primary survey was conducted throughout Thailand by collecting data from 1462 retailers and 1535 consumers during January to March 2018. The results indicate that the profitability of retailers who have adopted online sales (click-and-mortar retailers) is significantly higher than that of those who have not adopted online sales (brick-and-mortar retailers). The operating efficiency of the latter group is significantly lower than that of the former. The social impact in terms of new employment opportunities created is negligible by the adoption of online sales, however, the click-and-mortar shops have more employees per shop than that of their counterparts. The penetration of online shopping in Thailand is estimated to be 24 percent among the four commodities under study. According to the B2C e-commerce Index-2015 estimated by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Thailand’s index value is 47.2 and positioned in the 70th place among 130 countries, whereas it is 60 for Malaysia (45th rank) and 84 for the Republic of Korea (8th rank). This estimate is showcasing only the infrastructure potential for B2C e-commerce in a country based on internet usage, credit card holders, etc. and no indicators of the actual transactions on commodities are included. It has been observed that the penetration of online shopping is not a threat, for the time being, to the brick-and-mortar shops in Thailand, since they have more than double the market share of online buyers. The perception of consumers in Thailand for online shopping is its convenience and novelty of browsing the virtual platform, nevertheless, the consumers have much anxiety in the risks related to online shopping, regarding the performance of the products bought online, and the financial risks of online transactions. Moreover, the consumers have discontent on the economic laws prevailing in the country for the protection of their rights, in case of loss caused by online transactions, and most of the offline consumers are unaware of such laws. Therefore, the study recommends the vendors to be more upright and hold consistently the ethical values in their dealings with consumers, and the public authorities have to enact appropriate laws and implement it effectively for the protection of consumer rights so as to build a proactive environment for consumerism. This is highly indispensable for any emerging market economy. The study highlights the regional imbalance in the development and growth of e-commerce in Thailand, where the scale of penetration is high in central and northeastern regions, but low in north and southern regions.