eBRF 2001

eTampere, an ambitious information society development program and pilot of eEurope, is underway in Finland. One of the seven modules of eTampere is the TUT-UTA (Tampere University of Technology and University of Tampere) joint e-Business Research Center, eBRC (est. 6/2001). One of eBRC’s first objectives was to create a new academic forum for those exploring the "Frontiers of e-Business Research".

An annual conference, e-Business Research Forum (eBRF), was launched to encourage new, multidisciplinary, border-crossing research on the e-business phenomenon. The eBRF 2001 Call for Abstracts was centered around four themes or windows on e-business as a research phenomenon. Efficiency called for research on e-business as new forms and ways of improving function-specific-processes in different organizations; Engagement as new forms and ways of strategic partnering, networking, and trading; Entrepreneurship as new forms and ways of building and doing business; and Ethics as new forms and ways of contracting and interacting between businesses and consumers.

Abstracts submitted by the September 30 deadline went through a double blind review. A total of 30 abstracts were approved for presentation at eBRF 2001. Altogether over 100 researchers, business practitioners, and research funders participated in the conference events in Tampere, during November 5-6. After the conference, presenters had until year end 2001 to submit completed papers to be published in Frontiers of e-Business Research (FeBR) 2001 – the eBRF 2001 conference proceedings.