An investigation of the effect of electronic business on financial performance of Spanish manufacturing SMEs.

This paper aims to fill research gaps in the existing literature on the effect of electronic business on financial firm performance within the specific context of manufacturing Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). More specifically, this research analyzes not only the direct effects of e-business on firm performance but also the mediating effect of organizational innovation the relationship. Building on the knowledge and resource-based views, the proposed research model and its associated hypotheses are tested by using partial least squares (PLS) structural equation modeling on a dataset of Spanish manufacturing SMEs. Results suggest that electronic business has a direct effect on financial performance and is positively associated to organizational innovation. In addition, results show that the relationship between electronic business and financial performance is mediated by organizational innovation

BENEFITS AND CHALLENGES OF CLOUD COMPUTING IN PRODUCTION AND SERVICE SECTOR IN IZMIR, THE CITY OF TURKEY

Purpose of the study: This research aims to understand the benefits and challenges of cloud and non-cloud adopter companies of production and service sectors on cloud computing and making recommendations based on companies’ perceptions of the issue in Izmir, Turkey. Methodology: This is a descriptive survey of businesses, forming a questionnaire for 99 companies in the service sector and 66 companies in the production sector to non-cloud or cloud user businesses in the city of Izmir in Turkey. SPSS 26.0 software is used to analyze the perceived benefits and challenges of cloud computing. Main Findings: The descriptive analysis results show that increasing productivity in business processes and working collaboratively from remote are the most important perceived benefits of adopting cloud computing in the production sector and service sector, respectively. On the other hand, business processes adoption issues and concerns about security are the significant perceived challenges and barriers of cloud computing adoption, respectively. Applications of this study: The study is useful for governments to understand the critical points of cloud computing and is believed to give governments the ability to prepare an appropriate environment for businesses. Cloud providers and companies also take a position to contribute to this environment by creating new I.T. products and purchasing these I.T. products conforming to their I.T. needs, respectively. Novelty/Originality of this study: This research provides companies in Izmir with a guide for the adoption considering the appropriate cloud computing deployment models such as public cloud, private cloud, community cloud and hybrid cloud for certain types of applications such as software as a service (SaaS), platform as a service(PaaS) and Infrastructure as a service (IaaS) for developing countries

Cloud Computing Adoption Motivation in the European North and South

The European North-South divide has been one of the most important and widely debated problems of Europe for long time. The countries of the European South have for decades lower levels of economic and technological development and performance than the countries of the European North; though there has been a convergence between the European North and South for some time, recently, due to the economic crisis, this trend has stopped, and on the contrary a divergence is observed. It is widely recognized that in order to overcome this negative situation, and achieve a gradual convergence between these two regions, it is important not only to cut wages and public expenditure in the European South (which has been the dominant approach so far), but also to make wider and better use of new technologies and boost innovation. This paper contributes in this direction, comparing empirically the European North and South with respect to one of the most important, innovative and disruptive new information and communication technologies (ICT): the cloud computing (CC). CC is emerging as a new paradigm of providing ICT support of firms’ and activities, which can not only reduce costs (especially investments), but also enable the rapid and low cost experimentation with and exploitation of new emerging technologies, and also support and facilitate innovation and external collaboration. In particular, we empirically investigate and compare Northern and Southern European firms with respect not to the ‘quantity’ of CC use, but to its ‘quality’: their CC adoption motivations and orientations. Our study has been based on a dataset collected through the e-Business W@tch Survey of the European Commission from 556 European firms from the glass, ceramic and cement sectors. It has been concluded that Southern European firms of the above sectors view CC as a means of reducing ICT investment, while Northern European ones view it as a means of supporting and facilitating product/service innovation, and also of reducing cost and increasing capabilities of their existing external electronic collaboration (with business partners and experts) for the development of innovations. Furthermore, both Northern and Southern European firms of the above sectors view CC as a means of experimentation with and exploitation of new emerging technologies