Opportunities and Challenges for the Electronic Commerce Deployment in Developing Countries Discussed in a Case of Saudi Arabia

One of the most popular activities on the Web is shopping. It has much allure in it – you can shop at your leisure, anytime, and in your pajamas. Literally anyone can have their pages built to display their specific goods and services. Electronic commerce (ecommerce) has been defined as the process of buying, selling, transferring or exchanging products, services, and/or information via computer networks, including the Internet (Turban, 2006). E-commerce includes consumers purchasing goods and services online; as well as businesses selling and communicating with other businesses through the Internet. E-Commerce is not a new phenomenon. It has been around for at least three decades. Banks have used their own telecommunications lines since the early 1960s to transfer funds electronically from one branch to another and from one bank to another. This may be regarded as the earliest use of commerce executed by means of electronic data transferred through communications lines