Mahajan spoke to The Financial Express after releasing the e-business technology forecast of PwC at a press conference here. PwC is one of the leading professional services organisation in the world employing 1,55,000 people in 150 countries.

According to Mahajan, "ERP companies like SAP and Oracle are looking at certain vertical domains where they have expertise in introducing e-commerce modules within their packages. Some amount of supplier interface and front-ends will soon have to built into ERP solutions for the e-commerce needs."

PwC is one of the major implementers of ERP solutions in the country and has alliances with all major ERP software developers in the world. The company isalso looking at other possible alliances to cater to the second generation ERP needs.

The E-business technology forecast says while chief executives and senior executives of many corporates, world-wide, understand that businesses are being transformed by internet-based commerce, they are still unclear about moving from where they are today to becoming an e-business.

Among the trends forecast, the study says that currency will not become digital in the near future. Payment cards will be dominant and digital cash systems will find niche applications in certain segments.

There will be more price negotiations on the internet for transactions. Special technologies available for price negotiations will be integrated into websites.