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An Empirical Study of Information Technology Capabilities to Enable Value Chain Activities and Interfaces

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Abstract

Information technology (IT) is a critical resource and asset for a firm’s internal operations and external interactions with outside stakeholders. This paper explores IT capabilities that enable a retailer’s value chain activities and interfaces with suppliers and customers. IT capabilities that enable the value chain activities of logistics and operations as well as those of marketing and sales are identified to examine how they influence a retailer’s implementation of value chain interfaces. Through the lens of organizational information processing theory (OIPT), we find that both IT capabilities and IT infrastructure play a pivotal role in implementing value chain interfaces but in distinctive ways. On the supplier-facing side, a retailer’s IT infrastructure and IT capabilities enabling logistics and operations are essential to its vendor-managed inventory (VMI) system. On the customer-facing side, a retailer’s e-commerce website requires IT infrastructure and IT capabilities that enable marketing and sales. Moreover, synergies are found downstream for e-commerce website that benefits from the integration of IT infrastructure and IT capabilities enabling logistics and operations while such synergies are not found upstream for VMI. This partial complementary effect is explicated by the sequential asymmetric information dependency of value chain activities. Finally, we discuss the implications of our findings for the research and practice of IT enablement and integration.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Management Information Systems, College of Commerce, National Chengchi University, Taipei, 11605, Taiwan, Republic of China

    Yen-Chun Chou

  2. Department of Information Systems, W. P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, 85287, USA

    Benjamin B. M. Shao

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  1. Yen-Chun Chou
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Chou, YC., Shao, B.B.M. An Empirical Study of Information Technology Capabilities to Enable Value Chain Activities and Interfaces. Inf Syst Front 25, 1533–1547 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10796-022-10301-5

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