Digital Business - Understand the digital world (Coursera)

Digital Business - Understand the digital world (Coursera)

Facebook, AirBnB, Tesla, Amazon, Uber. In just a few years, companies like these have changed the face of the global economy. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of start-ups are disrupting old business models, taking on centennial industrial groups – and winning. It’s clear that the rules of business have changed forever.

Class Deals by MOOC List - Click here and see Coursera's Active Discounts, Deals, and Promo Codes.

This MOOC provides a knowledge toolkit for the ongoing digital revolution. You’ll discover 10 concepts that are essential for understanding the new mechanisms of digital business and innovation.
Each concept is explained in its own beautifully designed, content-rich instructional video, along with additional resources for you to explore. The ideas are illustrated with up-to-the-minute case studies and examples from a wide range of industries.
This MOOC is ideal for learners from a wide range of backgrounds. It is brought to you by three expert professors and researchers from IMT - Telecom Paris, a leading European graduate school in the field of digital technology and social science.
This MOOC is supported by the Patrick and Lina Drahi Foundation.

Course 1 of 4 in the Digital Business Specialization.

Syllabus

WEEK 1
Why Digital Changes Everything
Many people have yet to realize just how rapid and profound the current digital revolution is, or how quickly it’s breaking down old institutions. Yes, we’re always hearing about Google, Uber, and all those “pirate entrepreneurs.” Yes, we know technology has something to do with it. But the future is approaching even more quickly that we think. Right now, all the pieces are in place to completely change the face of products, technologies, organizations, and entrepreneurship over the next few years. This module will tell you how and why.

WEEK 2
Creating Value in a Digital World
Once upon a time, the rules of the game were simple. People worked away in their offices to develop and sell products or services, and shared the margin between price and cost. But now this product-based way of competing is all but gone – wiped out by the new principles of value creation. Going digital means playing by new rules, powered by network effects and system goods, that radically changed the fundamentals of business. Now, people create value outside their offices by connecting in third places, and the best way to turn a profit can be to give your products away, or share your knowledge, for free. Across the board, old-style value chains are being completely disrupted by new business ecosystems.

WEEK 3
Thinking and acting differently
Going digital is a bit like emigrating to another country. To succeed digitally, people and firms need to adopt a whole new mindset. Entrepreneurs should forget about building the perfect business plan, and instead put the focus on “trial and learn” processes. And companies should forget about long-term strategy, protecting their IP, product planning, and entry barriers, and concentrate on running instead of defending. This is true in every area from strategic decision-making through to getting the most from the assets that firms own, control, or use – knowledge assets in particular.

Go to Class
MOOC List is learner-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Related Courses

Professional Responsibility and Ethics for Accountants (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Professional Responsibility and Ethics for Accountants (Coursera)

Accountants perform a wide variety of activities which include, but are not limited to, accounting, auditing, tax, management consulting, and financial management. However, a professional accountant’s responsibility is not exclusively to satisfy the needs of an employer or professional services client. One of the distinguishing characteristics of the accounting profession is its acceptance of the responsibility to act in the public interest.

Sep 14th 2026
4 Weeks
Developing a Google SRE Culture (Coursera) Coursera
Google Cloud

Developing a Google SRE Culture (Coursera)

In many IT organizations, incentives are not aligned between developers, who strive for agility, and operators, who focus on stability. Site reliability engineering, or SRE, is how Google aligns incentives between development and operations and does mission-critical production support. Adoption of SRE cultural and technical practices can help improve collaboration between the business and IT. This course introduces key practices of Google SRE and the important role IT and business leaders play in the success of SRE organizational adoption.

Sep 14th 2026
3 Weeks
Infonomics II: Business Information Management and Measurement (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Infonomics II: Business Information Management and Measurement (Coursera)

Even decades into the Information Age, accounting practices yet fail to recognize the financial value of information. Moreover, traditional asset management practices fail to recognize information as an asset to be managed with earnest discipline. This has led to a business culture of complacence, and the inability for most organizations to fully leverage available information assets. This second course in the two-part Infonomics series explores how and why to adapt well-honed asset management principles and practices to information, and how to apply accepted and new valuation models to gauge information’s potential and realized economic benefits.

Sep 14th 2026
4 Weeks
Managing the Company of the Future (Coursera) Coursera
University of London,London Business School

Managing the Company of the Future (Coursera)

The aim of the course is to provide you with a comprehensive framework for understanding both the traditional principles of management inside companies today as well as the alternative principles that are becoming increasingly important. It provides both theoretical and practical perspectives on the nature of management in today’s organisations.

Sep 14th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Investment Management in an Evolving and Volatile World by HEC Paris and AXA Investment Managers (Coursera) Coursera
HEC Paris

Investment Management in an Evolving and Volatile World by HEC Paris and AXA Investment Managers (Coursera)

Have you ever wanted to invest in financial markets, but were always afraid that you didn’t have the proper tools or knowledge to make informed decisions? Have you ever wondered how investment management companies operate and what fund managers do? AXA Investment Managers, in partnership with HEC Paris, will introduce you to the most important ideas and concepts in investment management, to help you better understand your financial future.

Sep 14th 2026
4 Weeks
3D Printing Hardware (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

3D Printing Hardware (Coursera)

This course will provide an in-depth exploration of desktop 3D printing hardware. It will examine the history of desktop 3D printing and demonstrate how 3D printers are made and how they work. This course will also provide step-by-step instructions for how to use and repair a 3D printer. It will also explore the different types of materials that can be 3D printed and will demonstrate how you can create various objects using these tools and materials.

Sep 14th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Strategy and Sustainability (Coursera) Coursera
IESE Business School

Strategy and Sustainability (Coursera)

Business and environmental sustainability are not natural bedfellows. Business is about making money. Sustainability is about protecting the planet. Business is measured in months and quarters. Sustainability often requires significant short term costs to secure a sometimes uncertain long-term benefit. To some activists, all executives are exploitative, selfish one percenters. To some executives, all activists are irresponsible, unyielding extremists.

Sep 14th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Fundamentos de Excel para Negocios (Coursera) Coursera
Universidad Austral

Fundamentos de Excel para Negocios (Coursera)

Cuando finalices este curso habrás logrado un gran número de habilidades como introducir información, ordenarla, manipularla, realizar cálculos de diversa índole (matemáticos, trigonométricos, estadísticos, financieros, ingenieriles, probabilísticos), extraer conclusiones, trabajar con fechas y horas, construir gráficos, imprimir reportes y muchas más.

Sep 14th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Subsistence Marketplaces (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Subsistence Marketplaces (Coursera)

The foundation for this course lies with unique synergies between pioneering research, teaching, and social initiatives through the Subsistence Marketplaces Initiative. Unique to this approach is a bottom-up understanding of the intersection of poverty and the marketplace. The goals of this course are to help you develop an understanding of marketplace activity in the radically different context of subsistence where much of humanity resides and survives, and for you to design solutions that can be implemented by individuals, businesses, and social enterprises through economically, ecologically, and socially sustainable products for subsistence marketplaces.

Sep 14th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Behavioral Finance (Coursera) Coursera
Duke University

Behavioral Finance (Coursera)

We make thousands of decisions every day. Do I cross the road now, or wait for the oncoming truck to pass? Should I eat fries or a salad for lunch? How much should I tip the cab driver? We usually make these decisions with almost no thought, using what psychologists call “heuristics” – rules of thumb that enable us to navigate our lives. Without these mental shortcuts, we would be paralyzed by the multitude of daily choices.

Sep 14th 2026
3 Weeks
The Factors that Influence the Effectiveness of Boards and the Governance Process (Coursera) Coursera
University at Buffalo,The State University of New York

The Factors that Influence the Effectiveness of Boards and the Governance Process (Coursera)

The third course in this Specialization introduces you to the factors that influence how effective boards of directors will be in carrying out their roles and responsibilities and hence the impact they have in shaping the success of the organization they govern. While this course has been developed with North American culture in mind, we do appreciate that, in other parts of the world, the nature of the factors that influence the effectiveness of nonprofit boards of directors may vary. Nevertheless,it is our hope that much of the course content will still be of value to those in other parts of the world.

Sep 14th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Managerial Accounting Fundamentals (Coursera) Coursera
University of Virginia

Managerial Accounting Fundamentals (Coursera)

This course will teach you the fundamentals of managerial accounting including how to navigate the financial and related information managers need to help them make decisions. You'll learn about cost behavior and cost allocation systems, how to conduct cost-volume-profit analysis, and how to determine if costs and benefits are relevant to your decisions.

Sep 14th 2026
4 Weeks