ERP On Demand Platform - Complementary Effects Using the Example of a Sustainability Benchmarking Service

Platforms for SaaS-based enterprise applications are prospering and the number of on-demand ERP vendors is increasing. We combine both phenomena for the first time and illustrate how the integration of a sustainability benchmarking service into an on-demand ERP platform provides added value beyond pure cost savings. By applying a qualitative system dynamics approach we identify self-reinforcing mechanisms which allow a faster and more comprehensive market penetration compared to providing these services separately

Confidential Information-Sharing for Automated Sustainability Benchmarks

The pressure on enterprises to manage and improve their environmental sustainability is steadily increasing. Despite the growing awareness in the IS community and business practice, current IS solutions remain in an initial state. Sustainability benchmarking is seen as a novel and effective tool in this context. However, sustainability benchmarking faces two major obstacles: First, the heterogeneity of the data requires significant pre-processing, and, second, the sensitivity of the data causes enterprises to reluctantly share this data. Our contribution is twofold: After analyzing the data input problem and identifying appropriate and available solutions, we present a secure sustainability benchmarking service (SBS) to overcome the information-sharing problem. Our service uses homomorphic encryption to protect the data during processing and differential privacy to protect against leakages from the reports. Finally, we evaluate in detail a prototypical implementation of this secure sustainability benchmarking service and illustrate its applicability in industry

SMEs: ERP or virtual collaboration teams

Small firms are indeed the engines of global economic growth. Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) play an important role to promote economic development. SMEs in the beginning of implementing new technologies always face capital shortage and need technological assistance. Available ERP systems do not fulfil the specific requirements of Small firms. SMEs has scarce resources and manpower therefore many SMEs don?t have the possessions to buy and operate an ERP System. On the other hand competition and competitiveness of SMEs have to be strengthened. This paper briefly reviews the existing perspectives on virtual teams and their effect on SMEs management. It also discusses the main characteristics of virtual teams and clarifies the differences aspects of virtual team application in SMEs. After outlining some of the main advantages and pitfall of such teams, it concentrates on comparing of ERP and virtual collaborative teams in SMEs. Finally, it provides evidence for the need of ?Software as a Service (SaaS)? where an application is hosted as a service provided to customers across the web for SMEs as an alternative of ERP. It has been widely argued that ERP disadvantage in SMEs such as administrative expenditure and cost, isolated structure, severe lack of software flexibility, insufficient support of SMEs business and high operating cost, lead SMEs to use virtual collaborative team which is net work base solution

Selection Criteria for Software as a Service: An Explorative Analysis of Provider Requirements

Currently, customers can choose among many Cloud providers for enterprise systems. The provider selection involves several challenges to match individual customer requirements and provided service characteristics. Unfortunately, this process is not transparent and characterized by the lack of appropriate selection criteria. Research is mainly concentrated on capabilities and success factors on the customer side. A set of Cloud provider requirements from a customer perspective, especially within the context of an adoption of on-demand enterprise systems, have barely been discussed so far. In this paper we present a set of selection criteria for Software as a Service (SaaS). These criteria are developed to enable a Cloud provider comparison and match the customer requirements with the provider characteristics. We followed a design science approach and conducted a systematic literature review, an extensive market analysis of 651 providers and an evaluation based on expert interviews to develop the presented selection criteria

Information and digital technologies of Industry 4.0 and Lean supply chain management: a systematic literature review

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the current state of research and the key aspects and implications of the relationships between Information and Digital Technologies (IDT) of Industry 4.0 and Lean Supply Chain Management (LSCM), with the identification of the lines of research developed and an analysis of the main findings. A Systematic Literature Review methodology has been used for the identification, selection, and evaluation of the published research. A set of 78 papers deduced from the most relevant scientific databases, including Web of Science, Scopus, and ABI/Inform, from 1996 to December 2019, has been analyzed and synthesized. The analysis and evaluation of these papers has enabled a new classification of the literature to be offered that identifies four lines of research based on the Life Cycle of Technology: obsolete IDT in LSCM; mature IDT in LSCM; emerging IDT in LSCM; and an Information Systems and IDT general approach in LSCM. The paper goes on to discuss the gaps found in the literature and proposes new opportunities and challenges for future research. A series of implications are presented intended to be useful from not only an academic point-of-view but also from a management focus, including recommendations for industrial managers and policymakers

The Digitalisation of African Agriculture Report 2018-2019

An inclusive, digitally-enabled agricultural transformation could help achieve meaningful livelihood improvements for Africa’s smallholder farmers and pastoralists. It could drive greater engagement in agriculture from women and youth and create employment opportunities along the value chain. At CTA we staked a claim on this power of digitalisation to more systematically transform agriculture early on. Digitalisation, focusing on not individual ICTs but the application of these technologies to entire value chains, is a theme that cuts across all of our work. In youth entrepreneurship, we are fostering a new breed of young ICT ‘agripreneurs’. In climate-smart agriculture multiple projects provide information that can help towards building resilience for smallholder farmers. And in women empowerment we are supporting digital platforms to drive greater inclusion for women entrepreneurs in agricultural value chains

Innovation ecosystems for industry 4.0 : a collaborative perspective for the provision of digital technologies and platforms

Industry 4.0 considers complex interrelated IoT-based technologies for the provision of digital solutions. This complexity demands a vast set of capabilities that are hard to be found in a single technology provider, especially in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Innovation ecosystems allow SMEs to integrate resources and cocreate Industry 4.0 solutions. This thesis investigates the role of collaboration for the development of technologies and solutions in the Industry 4.0 context. To this end, this thesis was organized into three papers, which objectives are: (i) to verify if collaboration through inbound Open Innovation activities with different actors in the supply chain positively moderates the relationship between Industry 4.0 technologies and their expected benefits; (ii) to identify how the characteristics of an innovation ecosystem focused on solutions for Industry 4.0 change at each evolutionary lifecycle stage using elements from social exchange theory; and (iii) to identify which technologies can be configured as platforms through boundary-spanning activities and how they operate collaboratively to develop solutions for Industry 4.0. As a result, this thesis proposes a model that explains the role of collaboration at different levels (supply chains, ecosystems, and platforms) for the development of solutions in the Industry 4.0 context. This research approach combines both qualitative (i.e., focus group, interviews, and case studies) and quantitative (i.e., survey research with multivariate data analysis) aspects. The main results obtained are: (i) we show how collaboration with different actors in the supply chain through Open Innovation strategy has both positive and negative impacts on three strategies associated with product development (cost reduction, focalization, and innovation); (ii) we define the main characteristics of innovation ecosystems focused on the provision of Industry 4.0 solutions, considering an evolutionary lifecycles perspective and a Social Exchange view (iii) we define which are the different technology platforms of the Industry 4.0 context at different operation levels using Boundary-Spanning view. As remarking conclusions, from an academic perspective, these results help to understand how collaboration for the development of new solutions in Industry 4.0 can be analyzed under different perspectives (Open Innovation, Social Exchange Theory, and Boundary-Spanning) and in different contexts of integration (supply chains, ecosystems, and platforms). From a practical perspective, the results help to enlighten a trending business topic by showing how the collaboration among technology providers for Industry 4.0 should be fostered and developed

Integrating Enterprise System’s 3rd Wave Into IS Curriculum

This paper covers our observations that while enterprise systems are in their 4th Wave, current enterprise systems courses mainly cover the skills requirement up to the 2nd Wave. In this paper, we present our experience in developing an elective course (to address the 3rd Wave enterprise systems skills and knowledge) within the BSc Information Systems Management curriculum. This include the learning objectives and competencies, curriculum context, course structure, lab content, assessments, student evaluation and industry feedback

ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks: a literature review

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementation is a complex and vibrant process, one that involves a combination of technological and organizational interactions. Often an ERP implementation project is the single largest IT project that an organization has ever launched and requires a mutual fit of system and organization. Also the concept of an ERP implementation supporting business processes across many different departments is not a generic, rigid and uniform concept and depends on variety of factors. As a result, the issues addressing the ERP implementation process have been one of the major concerns in industry. Therefore ERP implementation receives attention from practitioners and scholars and both, business as well as academic literature is abundant and not always very conclusive or coherent. However, research on ERP systems so far has been mainly focused on diffusion, use and impact issues. Less attention has been given to the methods used during the configuration and the implementation of ERP systems, even though they are commonly used in practice, they still remain largely unexplored and undocumented in Information Systems research. So, the academic relevance of this research is the contribution to the existing body of scientific knowledge. An annotated brief literature review is done in order to evaluate the current state of the existing academic literature. The purpose is to present a systematic overview of relevant ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks as a desire for achieving a better taxonomy of ERP implementation methodologies. This paper is useful to researchers who are interested in ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks. Results will serve as an input for a classification of the existing ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks. Also, this paper aims also at the professional ERP community involved in the process of ERP implementation by promoting a better understanding of ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks, its variety and history