This kind of exponential growth is something that most Internet-based ebusinesses are trying to grapple with. Some countries don't celebrate Christmas. Other areas don't celebrate New Year's. So our systems don't get a holiday either. The financial industry also knows the tremendous cost of downtime.
Downtime is far more costly than the immediate loss of revenues and employee productivity, though.
Even more harmful can be damaged reputation and drops in a company's stock price and credit rating. One well known Internet auction site, for example, had a 22-hour operating system failure on June 12, 1999. A customer who's unable to log onto an e-commerce site might click to a competitor and never come back. That's a lesson that many e-businesses are just starting to appreciate. Just ask Patrik Egervall, executive vice president of OM Technology in Stockholm, Sweden, who has been devising B2B e-commerce solutions long before most people heard of the phrase.