There is growing recognition that firms' information technology (IT)-enabled business models (i.e., how interfirm transactions with suppliers, customers, and partners are structured and executed) are a distinctive source of value creation and appropriation. However, the concept of business models' (BMs) “IT enablement” remains coarse in the information systems and strategic management literatures. Our objectives are to introduce a framework to elaborate the concept of IT-enabled BMs and to identify areas for future research that will enhance our understanding of the subject. We introduce the idea that two business-to-business (B2B) IT capabilities—<i>dyadic IT customization</i> and <i>network IT standardization</i>—are the mediating <i>execution</i> mechanisms between the strategic intent of interfirm collaboration and the (re)configuration of BMs to both create and appropriate value. We develop the logic that B2B IT capabilities for BM (re)configuration operate at two levels—IT customization at the dyadic relationship level and IT standardization at the interfirm network level—that together provide the complementary IT capabilities for firms to exchange content, govern relationships, and structure interconnections between products and processes with a diverse set of customers, suppliers, and partners. We discuss how these two complementary B2B IT capabilities are pivotal for firms to pursue different sources of value creation and appropriation. We identify how a firm's governance choices to engage in interfirm collaboration and its interfirm networks coevolve with its B2B IT capabilities as fruitful areas for future research.
Firms are increasingly dependent on external resources and are establishing portfolios of interorganizational relationships (IRs) to leverage external resources for competitive advantage. However, the systems of information technology (IT) and process capabilities that firms should develop to manage IR portfolios dynamically are not well-understood. In order to theorize how key structural IT capabilities (IT integration and IT reconfiguration) and competitive process capabilities (process alignment, partnering flexibility, and offering flexibility) operate as systems of complements, we draw on the competitive dynamics perspective and resource dependency theory and on the literature for IT business value, interorganizational systems, and interorganizational relationship management. We also theorize how a firm's IR portfolio moderates the effects of structural IT capabilities on competitive process capabilities and why a firm's environmental turbulence moderates the effects of complementary process capabilities on competitive performance. We test our model using survey data from 318 firms in 4 industries. Our results provide broad support for the following: (1) structural IT capabilities and process capabilities operating as a system of complements, (2) the effects of structural IT capabilities on competitive process capabilities being contingent on IR portfolio concentration, and (3) the effects of complementary process capabilities on competitive performance being contingent on environmental turbulence. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of how firms should develop complementary systems of structural IT capabilities and competitive process capabilities to manage IR portfolios dynamically and leverage external resources.
We investigate the assimilation of electronic procurement innovations (EPIs) and its impact on procurement productivity in buyer organizations. We identify online reverse auctions, electronic catalog management, electronic order fulfillment, and electronic payment and settlement as moderate complements for the performance of the procurement process. We develop a theoretical model that is informed by the literature on innovation assimilation and by structuration theory to explain the aggregated assimilation of EPIs. Our empirical study is based on survey data collected about EPIs from 166 buyer firms. Based on our analysis, we isolate the organizational, technological, and interorganizational factors that shape the meta-structures for the aggregated assimilation of EPIs. Our results also provide evidence of a substantial impact of the assimilation of these innovations on procurement productivity. Our post hoc analysis provides insights on differences across stages and across EPIs on the factors and meta-structures that enable assimilation.