E-commerce postgraduate degree attracts professionals
The University of Queensland Business School is attracting plenty of professional enquiries about a new electronic commerce stream to be offered in the Master of Commerce program from next year.
Head of the Commerce Department Professor Frank Finn said there had been great interest in the course stream from lawyers, architects, accountants and other people concerned at how Internet commerce would affect their businesses.
Project director for the new course is auditing and accounting information systems specialist Associate Professor Colin Ferguson, who also co-ordinates the Bachelor of Electronic Commerce degree program offered by the School.
Dr Ferguson said as a result of current and anticipated future growth in electronic commerce, organisations would have to make fundamental changes to their structures and processes if they were to survive in the long run.
"Electronic commerce is a major growth area and reliable forecasts of the sale of goods over the Internet in Australia will be more than $8 billion by the year 2000 with the potential for trade on the Internet in Australia to rise to $100 billion by the year 2009. Home shopping will account for $24 billion by 2005," he said. "In time, electronic commerce will touch all businesses, no matter how small. There's no question about that. When that happens even the smallest corner store will have the same characteristics as a BHP, especially in the audit sense."
Professor Finn said the University's Master of Commerce program allowed graduates of any discipline to concentrate their studies in one of four areas of professional development. As well as the electronic commerce stream, students can specialise in applied finance, information systems and professional accounting.
He said there had been many international enquiries about the electronic commerce stream- particularly from students in Asia - and the UQ Business School was considering establishing the course in Singapore and Malaysia. The deputy head of the Department of Business Administration at Singapore Polytechnic will research the University's electronic commerce program next semester during study leave at the University.
For further information about enrolling in a Master of Commerce degree, contact the UQ Commerce Department 07 3365 6283, email: commerce@commerce.uq.edu.au, or the UQ Business School, telephone 07 3365 7111, email: facultybel@mailbox.uq.edu.au
Media: For further information, telephone Professor Frank Finn telephone 07 3365 6591 or Dr Colin Ferguson at (07) 3365 6631.
