'E-biz 99', Nasscom's (National Association of Software and Services Companies) conference on e-commerce, saw the captains of industry and information technology discuss the biggest business opportunity of the next millennium --  e-commerce, short for electronic commerce. An audience of over 350 people at the Oberoi Towers in Mumbai, had the opportunity to listen to the leaders of infotech and e-business at the conference.

This conference was aimed at addressing the needs and concerns of the Indian business community regarding e-commerce. The main subject areas covered were: dynamics of electronic business, getting into e-business, converting traditional systems into e-business, technologies for e-business, security, supply chain management and customer relationship management. The conference was organised with a view to inducing a new wave of thinking, for people in Indian businesses to understand the future and strategise for the emerging opportunities in e-commerce.

Speaking at the conference, Nasscom president Dewang Mehta said that e-commerce, or e-business, is emerging as the new business opportunity in India. He said, "We do not see a business surviving without adopting e-business in the next five years." He felt that for e-businesses to proliferate in India, we would require the establishment of a global telecom infrastructure and tariffs accompanied by a comprehensive regulatory framework.

Mr Mehta released a for e-commerce growth in India. Nasscom is working closely with the government of India to develop a framework for implementation of these action points, specifically those regarding the telecom infrastructure and cyber-laws which would help make the country an e-business hub.

E-business is an opportunity for Indian businesses to become competitive and attain global standards. It is also an opportunity for the Indian software and services sector to emerge as a leader in providing e-commerce solutions.

Mr Mehta argued that India's rapidly restructuring industry should embrace cost-effective, scalable, and user-friendly technologies while adopting e-business. He added that the purpose of the conference was also to assert that e-businesses can grow from existing IT systems in organisations.

Pointing to the growing opportunity for Indian IT companies in the e-business solutions area, Mr Mehta said that this market was expected to be worth over Rs.3,000 crore by the year 2002. Nasscom's estimate puts the software solutions and services export earnings for India from e-commerce solutions at $ 1 billion in the year 2002.

Ravindra Gupta, secretary, department of electronics, inaugurated the conference. He said that e-business would cut across the functioning of governments, companies and individuals, and that it presents an opportunity for businesses to attain global standards.

Special guest of honour Murli Deora, Congress MP, said that the governments at the central and state level have recognised the importance of e-business and the changes and opportunities emerging from it.

Several leading IT industry personalities spoke at the sessions that followed. They included: Amitabh Kumar, chairman and managing director of VSNL, Nripendra Mishra from the ministry of commerce, A K Chakravarti of the department of electronics, Atul Vijaykar, head of Intel Asia, Anjan Mukherji of Price Waterhouse Coopers, Harish Mehta of Onward Novel, Naresh Nagarajan of Cognizant Technology Solutions, Sridhar Iyengar of KPMG India, Ajit Balakrishnan of Rediff on the Net, I B Saxena of Baba Bazaar, Rajesh Uppal of Maruti Udyog Ltd, Ranjit Limaye of IBM India, Neeraj Bhargava of McKinsey & Company, Surya Kant of TCS, Girish Bodas of GEIS, Subbu Iyer of Cambridge Technology Partners, R N Raja of SCO, Manish Modi of Netacross Limited, Shriram Adukoorie of Microsoft, S Kumar of Satyam Infoway Ltd, Deepak Patil of Verifone Systems, Nishith Desai, and Sanjeev Patni of Thyron Informatics.

The event was sponsored by Cognizant Technology Solutions, IBM Global Services, Lotus, Rediff on the Net, SCO and VSNL.