Claudia Loebbecke

SMEs, co-opetition and knowledge sharing: the role of information systems

Co-opetition, simultaneous cooperation and competition, is a recent phenomenon. Co-opetition entails sharing knowledge that may be a key source of competitive advantage. Yet, the knowledge gained by cooperation may also be used for competition. However, there is little investigation of how this problem may be modelled and, hence, managed. A game–theoretic framework for analysing interorganisational knowledge sharing under co-opetition and guidelines for the management of explicit knowledge predicated on coordination and control theory has been proposed, but remains untested. This research empirically investigates these issues in the context of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). SMEs provide an interesting setting as they are knowledge generators, but are poor at knowledge exploitation. The paper uses data from U.K. SMEs to investigate co-opetition, management of knowledge sharing and the role of IS.

Reflections on societal and business model transformation arising from digitization and big data analytics

In the era of accelerating digitization and advanced big data analytics, harnessing quality data for designing and delivering state-of-the-art services will enable innovative business models and management approaches (Boyd and Crawford, 2012; Brynjolfsson and McAfee, 2014) and yield an array of consequences. Among other consequences, digitization and big data analytics reshape business models and impact employment amongst knowledge workers - just as automation did for manufacturing workers. This Viewpoint paper considers the mechanisms underlying how digitization and big data analytics drive the transformation of business and society and outlines the potential effects of digitization and big data analytics on employment - especially in the context of cognitive tasks. Its aim is to outline a critical research agenda to explore and conceptualize evident changes in business models and society arising from these technological advances.

Does Competition Promote Trust and Trustworthiness in Online Trading? An Experimental Study

We investigate whether greater market competition improves or inhibits the ability of feedback systems in Internet markets to deliver trust and trustworthiness to the marketplace. Our investigation is grounded in the theory of signaling from information economics. Using methods from experimental economics, we create a laboratory online market where sellers face a moral hazard. We manipulate the level of market competition and the nature of the social network behind the feedback system and study the affect on trust, trustworthiness, and market efficiency. We find that competition in strangers networks, where market encounters are one-shot and reputation information is communicated through outside parties, improves trust, trustworthiness, and market efficiency. The efficiency advantage that partners networks, where a buyer can maintain a repeated relationship with a seller, have over strangers networks largely vanishes with the introduction of competition. This is because the difference in the pattern of social networking largely disappears. Overall, encouraging competition leads to more effective feedback systems in Internet markets. We discuss implications for trader strategy and Internet market design.

Interactive, inter‐organizational innovations in electronic commerce

Electronic commerce has been recognised as a source of fundamental change to the conduct of business. Exploitation by business of this innovative approach to payments will necessitate wide‐scale adoption of new processes and technologies and may require new thinking on how organizations adopt innovations. Primarily, these innovations will be interactive and inter‐organizational, i.e. a successful cash substitute will require the concurrent participation of many different organizations, as well as consumers. Current theoretical models of adoption may not cater for this type of innovation. This paper compares four diverse pilot implementations of smart‐card payment systems with Rogers’ (1995) attributes of innovations, adoption processes and adoption decision approaches for organizations. In general, Rogers’ models do not reflect the levels of complexity and diversity found in practice. Extensions of the models are proposed.

What drives netsourcing decisions? An empirical analysis

Netsourcing, a rather innovative form of web-enabled value creation, describes outsourcing of selected software applications to external service providers via the Internet. It promises flexibility and cost advantages over operating software applications in-house. However, it also raises the question which software applications corporate users should netsource and which they should keep in-house. To answer these questions, we develop a research framework with seven independent variables derived from the literature on full information technology outsourcing. On data collected in a 2004 survey among the 500 largest German companies, we apply a logistic regression analysis. As a result, we find significant statistical support for strategic management variables and no support for transaction cost economics variables as being relevant to the netsourcing decision. We conclude the paper with some lessons learned and suggestions for further research.

Strategic management implications of a consumer value perspective on Mobile TV

Understanding of consumer experienced value in mobile services continues to be a strategic issue in the information systems literature. This is no different with Mobile TV that has become feasible with the convergence of telecommunication infrastructures, computer technology, and media content services. Mobile TV offerings are defined as real-time broadcast transmissions of content to mobile devices. We review mobile services literatures on consumer value creation and identify a gap in our understanding of how supplier firms consumer-focused strategies may aid in consumption processes and thereby increase payments from consumers. We apply the perspective of consumer benefits experienced (CBE) to provide insight into how supplier firms may be able to increase consumer value. Value increases with greater consumer service-specific knowledge, and leveraging and complementing this knowledge across different offerings. Increased service-specific knowledge can also reduce demands on the consumer that can create important switching costs while increasing consumer-experienced value. This paper contributes to innovation research on mobile services.

A Competitive Perspective on Standard-Making: Kaufhof's RFID Project in Fashion Retailing

Many companies are considering implementing Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology to enhance supply chain management through better coordination and collaboration. However, until recently, the incompatibility of RFID systems hindered RFID adoption and impeded coordination and collaboration among adopters. Hence, companies demanded RFID standards. In light of joint RFID standard-making under the umbrella of the industry association EPCglobal, this paper investigates Kaufhofs RFID project from the Kaufhof-Gerry Weber pilot via unit-level to item-level roll-out. Guided by the literature on standard-making, we find that Kaufhof-facing the trade-off between actively participating in joint standard-making and pursuing its competitive interests by the means of stand-alone efforts-decided for joint standard-making. The paper interprets that finding on the basis of two arguments: A commonly accepted standard is necessary for both individual benefits and overall increased supply chain efficiency; and typically occurring collective action risks are mitigated by collective governance mechanisms.

Supporting cognitive feedback using system dynamics: a demand model of the global system of mobile telecommunication

Abstract Cognitive feedback has been known to be useful in providing decision makers with insights for enhancement of the modeling process. This paper proposes a design methodology to embed functionalities that integrate cognitive feedback in a computer-based decision support environment. From a system dynamics perspective, this paper proposes five types of information cues capable of providing cognitive feedback support at the individual, interpersonal and collective levels. DSS tools are also identified to deliver these information cues to the users. The proposed approach has been successfully applied in the construction of a decision model using system dynamics to forecast the demand for cellular telecommunications up to the year 2005 for Vietnam. Lessons learned from our model suggest that cognitive feedback is an appropriate approach to building a computer-based cognitive aid.

Electronic trading in on-line delivered content

Electronically traded On-line Delivered Content (ODC) is data, information, and knowledge traded on the Internet or through other on-line means. ODC includes on-line newspapers, magazines, music, education, searchable databases, consulting, and eventually expertise ideas. This paper outlines the growing importance of ODC. It then attempts to position electronic trading in ODC within the wider field of Electronic Commerce. It identifies its distinctive characteristics compared to other forms of trading content as well as electronic trading in physical goods. Important ODC peculiarities are identified and analyzed. Based on the case of a medium-sized specialized publisher, the benefits and problems of moving into the business of electronic trading in ODC are discussed. The paper concludes with an outlook and agenda for further research.

Preventing application software piracy: An empirical investigation of technical copy protections

To counteract application software piracy, software publishers have been implementing preventive technical copy protections into their software products. However, scientific research has not yet empirically investigated to what extent technical copy protections avoid illegal copying. Investigating this question, the paper studies the influence of technical copy protections on application software piracy. We apply descriptive statistics and a binary logistic regression to data collected from a survey of international software users. We show that technical protections fail in protecting application software from being illegally copied; none of the measures studied significantly avoids piracy. From this, we firstly derive implications for software publishers and researchers and secondly suggest directions for future research.