Generating e-capability: the case of HSBC in the UK

Electronic commerce (e-commerce) is one of the fastest growing sectors of the UK economy. All these changes imply that organizations need to develop new capabilities in managing e-commerce activities. In order to understand why an organization takes a particular direction in generating capability and the strategic lessons involved in managing e-banking activities, this study adopts a KBV perspective in examining the processes related to the generation of e-capability by using the framework suggested by Leonard-Barton (1992) as the main area of inquiry. The initial findings of the case study suggest that e-commerce has already created enormous interest in the world of information technology and across many industries. Firms dealing with transactions and serving their customers electronically have in turn presented unprecedented challenges to banks (Crede, 1999), and the latter have had to reassess their traditional methods of doing business. In other words, like all businesses, banks must develop new electronic on-line e-capabilities