Federico Pigni

Factors affecting ERP system adoption: a comparative analysis between SMEs and large companies

Purpose – Proposes providing an insight about enterprise resource planning (ERP) adoption, highlighting contact points and significant differences between the way small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) and large companies approach such a task.Design/methodology/approach – The research is based on a wide literature review, focused on the identification of a taxonomy of business and organizational factors influencing ERP adoption. The deriving research model was incorporated in a questionnaire that was preliminarily tested and finally provided to a sample of 366 companies of any size. Responses were collected through personal interviews made by a dedicated team to a top manager.Findings – The analysis of the empirical data shows that business complexity, as a composed factor, is a weak predictor of ERP adoption, whereas just company size turns out to be a very good one. In other words, companies seem to be disregarding ERP systems as an answer to their business complexity. Unexpectedly, SMEs disregard fin...

Digital data streams: Creating value from the real-time flow of Big Data

There is no escaping the Big Data hype. Vendors are peddling Big Data solutions; consulting firms employ Big Data specialists; Big Data conferences are aplenty. There is a rush to extract golden nuggets (of insight) from mountains (of data). By focusing merely on the mountain (of Big Data), these adventurers are overlooking the source of the revolution—namely, the many digital data streams (DDSs) that create Big Data—and the opportunity to improve real-time decision making. This article discusses the characteristics of DDSs, describes their common structure, and offers guidelines to enable firms to profit from their untapped potential.

Factors affecting RFId adoption in a vertical supply chain: the case of the silk industry in Italy

Radio Frequency Identification (RFId) adoption process is receiving a lot of attention in literature; studies assessing its potentials in supply chains (SCs) are now well documented. Despite this rising interest, the diffusion pattern of RFId systems in the vertical SCs has been only scarcely addressed and theoretical contributions explaining dynamics and drivers are still missing. This study shows that the diffusion of innovation theory can be effectively used to explore these questions in a vertical SC. However, three major considerations emerged: (1) the factors influencing, facilitating or inhibiting the adoption process change over time and during the adoption process; (2) facilitators such as business associations play an important role in the SCs composed of small and medium enterprises; and (3) the position of adopters within the SC greatly influences the diffusion process.

Bank Strategies and the Internet: An Interpretation of the Banking Industry Based on the Italian Retail Market

Abstract The introduction of innovative information and communication technologies (ICT) in conjunction with economic and legislative changes has substantially intensified competition in the banking industry. Consequently, Online Financial Services have developed greatly in terms of both quality and quantity. The banking industry scenario is characterized by a high level of uncertainty: a number of strategies seem to differentiate the financial institutions and it is debatable what variables banks should use to make their Internet-based activities more effective. This study aims to provide an interpretation of the Internet-based development of the banking industry starting from the identification of clusters of banks with similar strategies. The literature analysis has suggested the methodology of strategic grouping and has led to the identification of three main strategic variables: the amount of bank charges, the number of bank services available online and the number of distribution channels used. Data were collected through an extensive empirical study on a selection of 95 banks within the Italian retail market. The research outcomes provided support to the classification of the surveyed banks into five strategic groups that present specific characteristics and strategies.

An Explorative Analysis of the Effects of Information and Communication Technologies and Inter-Organizational Relationships on Supply Chain Management Systems

This paper explores in a supply chain context the influences that inter- organizational relationships have on the use of information and communication technology (ICT). In particular it analyzes the system use of the emergent patterns of supply chain management (SCM) by considering the underlying supported business processes. The research model was created for the study of the ICT usage patterns and has been applied through a detailed qualitative study conducted on the leading software distributor in Italy. The obtained results lead us to the conclusion that ICT usage emerges from the interaction of parties with available technologies.

SOLMED: solar energy and polymers for seawater desalination

AbstractCombining thermal solar energy and polymer materials allows seawater desalination while fossil fuels are saved and use of chemicals against fouling and corrosion is reduced. SOLar Multi-Effect Desalination (SOLMED) meets recommendations of the US National Research Council and Middle East Desalination Research Center of Oman regarding the future of water desalination. Water cost reduction and development of technologies with low environmental impact are the main guidelines of SOLMED. Thermal efficiency is at the heart of SOLMED. Process is based on low-temperature multi-effect distillation (LT-MED) powered by a thermal solar collector field, or better, by heat recovery at the outlet of a solar power plant. Heat transfer surfaces are made of thin wall polymer tubes to ensure a high thermal duty in spite of low thermal conductivity of polymers. Targeted capacities lie within 500–1,000 m3/d. The objective is to develop a LT-MED prototype made of polymers and to operate the system plugged to a solar he...

DDGS Affordances for Value Creation

The world is changing, and is changing thanks to the data. New opportunities for business action and service creation are emerging from the massive availability of real-time digital data. We characterize these opportunities proposing a framework rooted in the Technology Affordance theory studying the dynamic interactions between people and organizations, and the technological artifact. This approach provided encouraging results in understanding the dynamic nature of IT based innovation.

Zoorate: Certifying Online Consumer Reviews to Create Value

Zoorate was born from the ambition of the cofounders to develop a web portal for aggregating product reviews. From the seeding concept of matching reviewers by affinity, their core product, Feedaty, had evolved into a full-fledged platform for aggregating and certifying consumer feedback. Specifically targeting online sellers and merchants, by 2017 Zoorate had signed up more than 1,000 customers, constantly growing its client base since the product launch. Supported by the strategic partnership and synergies with its shareholder 7Pixel Srl, the firm appeared to have finally set sail for success. However, several challenges lay ahead. The main competitors were becoming stronger internationally, increasingly challenging Feedaty’s value proposition. How should they efficiently grow their primary product, Feedaty? How should they deal with strong international competition beginning to gain traction in Italy? Should they continue to consolidate their Italian presence or expand abroad? These were difficult questions, the answer to which would ultimately determine the future of the startup they had built.

Business Model in the IS Discipline: A Review and Synthesis of the Literature

Although the Business Model (BM) concept provides a convenient unit of analysis in the business practices, BM research in the Information Systems (IS) field emphasizes blurriness and divergences in its structure. With this paper we provide a clarification of the BM concept and update Al-debei and Avison [1] analysis on the BM literature. Using a structured methodology, we review the titles and the abstracts of 108 articles from IS literature and examine a significant subset of 49 articles. Our work contributes first, to formalize the concept of BM as instanced in IS domain and organizes BM studies around two different frameworks. Second, it highlights the BM research streams and their current states of the art. Last, it discusses the current limitations of the BM studies and offers the basis for future research.

TRIPBAM: Leveraging Digital Data Streams to Unleash Savings

TRIPBAM pioneered automated clustered rate monitoring in the hotel industry. After capturing a traveler’s reservation, TRIPBAM software scrutinized the digital data stream of changing room rates and notified users of any potential savings. While TRIPBAM could successfully discover savings for its many customers, its executives focused on the challenge of turning TRIPBAM into a resilient, viable business going forward. Many questions awaited a clear answer. Was the consumer space the one that had the greatest potential or should the firm focus exclusively on the corporate market? How could TRIPBAM protect its early advantage from its inevitable imitators? Both the consumer and business opportunities looked wide open even though each side presented distinct challenges to growth. To achieve profitability, TRIPBAM needed to not just grow the user base but also seek a unique position in the market to defend against the increasing number of startups entering their space. The case provides substantial data and information for students to step in the shoes of TRIPBAM’s executives and provide some answers to the above questions.