Modern information and communication technologies are transforming the business environment in which economic entities operate. Business partners are expected to provide faster responses, process automation, and reliable cooperation. As a result, entities are changing their ways of operating, adapting to new conditions. These changes are, in a sense, forced, as failing to accept them over a certain period may mean a deterioration in a company’s performance relative to existing opportunities. It is no wonder that these changes also affect the contracting process, which is one of the most important processes in the operations of most economic entities. Every day, companies prepare, negotiate, and execute dozens of contracts. Moving individual activities that make up procurement processes to the electronic sphere is facilitated by the fact that the contract conclusion process is largely based on interaction between contractors, and in particular on the exchange of information and documents. From a technical point of view, replacing traditional methods of interaction with new solutions, mainly through the use of information and documents in digital form, does not pose problems given the current state of technological development. By using electronic contracting mechanisms, individual steps of the procurement process can be performed faster and better.
The essence of eContracts
In the simplest terms, the essence of electronic contracting lies in the use of electronic means to perform individual activities at various stages of the contracting process, from preparing the contract, through negotiating and signing, to the execution of the concluded agreement. The process of concluding a contract rarely takes place without the support of electronic means, as it is difficult to imagine the stage of writing an offer, contract, or other related documents without a computer.
The article comes from the magazine “e-Fakty” 2/2005.