Future technologies will have far reaching implications as to the manner in which organizations are structured, operate, and transact day-to-day (24 hours per day) business; with all levels of stakeholders: B2B, B2C, C2C, and C2B. Software and wireless technologies will focus on: enterprise portal software to support data and information compilations for businesses, customers, and employees to make informed decisions to effectively run a business; content management technologies will afford firms the opportunity to manage content associated with personal computers, smart phones, and interactive television. Wireless innovations will give multiple stakeholders the capabilities to transmit worldwide data and information via voice applications (Kaplan, 2003).
Data and storage systems will provide organizations the capacity to effectively perform data management, data storage, data retrieval, and data security. Business applications technology will facilitate customer relationship management expertise and understanding for marketing and sales purposes. Additionally, such systems will support procurement processes and manage large volumes of products in a streamlined, costs effective manner. Hosting systems will provide companies with website capability and extensive bandwidth (Kaplan).
Security and Disaster Recovery Ventures will assist with the identification of individuals for purposes of access and egress relative to secured sites. Similarly, encryption software will be advanced for infusion into various computer systems and to protect data and information (Kaplan, 2003).
There is also a heighten need for biometrics technology for existing and new industries. This technology is capable of identifying individuals via their hair, iris, face, and voice; a much needed creativity for security reasons and extensive marketing. Structurally, international organizations may continue to use either a global area structure, a global product structure, or a global matrix structure. However, the most effective organization may be the informal organization; which focuses on and addresses human behaviors using streamline/virtual processes. Consequently, the least formal and more agile an international organization is, the better its global network will function.
In the future, researchers suggest a cross-border team or CBT; will be the appropriate international business model (Gupta & Govindarajan, 2004). As such, a CBT will represent an organization as: “cross-border teams of individuals of different nationalities, working in different [cultural settings], possibly in different businesses across different functions, who come together to coordinate some aspect of the multinational operations on a global basis” (Gupta & Govindarajan). Under escalating technologies and the CBT organizational model, the physical plant owners may either reduce their physical infrastructure size and/or locations or both all at once. For some industries, physical plants may become obsolete. Stated differently, in with new technologies and CBT and out with physical plants (hard assets).
