• 제목/요약/키워드: Firm Characteristic

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Dynamics of Technology Adoption in Markets Exhibiting Network Effects

  • Hur, Won-Chang
    • Asia pacific journal of information systems
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    • 제20권1호
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    • pp.127-140
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    • 2010
  • The benefit that a consumer derives from the use of a good often depends on the number of other consumers purchasing the same goods or other compatible items. This property, which is known as network externality, is significant in many IT related industries. Over the past few decades, network externalities have been recognized in the context of physical networks such as the telephone and railroad industries. Today, as many products are provided as a form of system that consists of compatible components, the appreciation of network externality is becoming increasingly important. Network externalities have been extensively studied among economists who have been seeking to explain new phenomena resulting from rapid advancements in ICT (Information and Communication Technology). As a result of these efforts, a new body of theories for 'New Economy' has been proposed. The theoretical bottom-line argument of such theories is that technologies subject to network effects exhibit multiple equilibriums and will finally lock into a monopoly with one standard cornering the entire market. They emphasize that such "tippiness" is a typical characteristic in such networked markets, describing that multiple incompatible technologies rarely coexist and that the switch to a single, leading standard occurs suddenly. Moreover, it is argued that this standardization process is path dependent, and the ultimate outcome is unpredictable. With incomplete information about other actors' preferences, there can be excess inertia, as consumers only moderately favor the change, and hence are themselves insufficiently motivated to start the bandwagon rolling, but would get on it once it did start to roll. This startup problem can prevent the adoption of any standard at all, even if it is preferred by everyone. Conversely, excess momentum is another possible outcome, for example, if a sponsoring firm uses low prices during early periods of diffusion. The aim of this paper is to analyze the dynamics of the adoption process in markets exhibiting network effects by focusing on two factors; switching and agent heterogeneity. Switching is an important factor that should be considered in analyzing the adoption process. An agent's switching invokes switching by other adopters, which brings about a positive feedback process that can significantly complicate the adoption process. Agent heterogeneity also plays a important role in shaping the early development of the adoption process, which has a significant impact on the later development of the process. The effects of these two factors are analyzed by developing an agent-based simulation model. ABM is a computer-based simulation methodology that can offer many advantages over traditional analytical approaches. The model is designed such that agents have diverse preferences regarding technology and are allowed to switch their previous choice. The simulation results showed that the adoption processes in a market exhibiting networks effects are significantly affected by the distribution of agents and the occurrence of switching. In particular, it is found that both weak heterogeneity and strong network effects cause agents to start to switch early and this plays a role of expediting the emergence of 'lock-in.' When network effects are strong, agents are easily affected by changes in early market shares. This causes agents to switch earlier and in turn speeds up the market's tipping. The same effect is found in the case of highly homogeneous agents. When agents are highly homogeneous, the market starts to tip toward one technology rapidly, and its choice is not always consistent with the populations' initial inclination. Increased volatility and faster lock-in increase the possibility that the market will reach an unexpected outcome. The primary contribution of this study is the elucidation of the role of parameters characterizing the market in the development of the lock-in process, and identification of conditions where such unexpected outcomes happen.

참여자관점에서 공급사슬관리 시스템의 성공에 영향을 미치는 요인에 관한 실증연구 (An Empirical Study on the Determinants of Supply Chain Management Systems Success from Vendor's Perspective)

  • 강성배;문태수;정윤
    • Asia pacific journal of information systems
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    • 제20권3호
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    • pp.139-166
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    • 2010
  • The supply chain management (SCM) systems have emerged as strong managerial tools for manufacturing firms in enhancing competitive strength. Despite of large investments in the SCM systems, many companies are not fully realizing the promised benefits from the systems. A review of literature on adoption, implementation and success factor of IOS (inter-organization systems), EDI (electronic data interchange) systems, shows that this issue has been examined from multiple theoretic perspectives. And many researchers have attempted to identify the factors which influence the success of system implementation. However, the existing studies have two drawbacks in revealing the determinants of systems implementation success. First, previous researches raise questions as to the appropriateness of research subjects selected. Most SCM systems are operating in the form of private industrial networks, where the participants of the systems consist of two distinct groups: focus companies and vendors. The focus companies are the primary actors in developing and operating the systems, while vendors are passive participants which are connected to the system in order to supply raw materials and parts to the focus companies. Under the circumstance, there are three ways in selecting the research subjects; focus companies only, vendors only, or two parties grouped together. It is hard to find researches that use the focus companies exclusively as the subjects probably due to the insufficient sample size for statistic analysis. Most researches have been conducted using the data collected from both groups. We argue that the SCM success factors cannot be correctly indentified in this case. The focus companies and the vendors are in different positions in many areas regarding the system implementation: firm size, managerial resources, bargaining power, organizational maturity, and etc. There are no obvious reasons to believe that the success factors of the two groups are identical. Grouping the two groups also raises questions on measuring the system success. The benefits from utilizing the systems may not be commonly distributed to the two groups. One group's benefits might be realized at the expenses of the other group considering the situation where vendors participating in SCM systems are under continuous pressures from the focus companies with respect to prices, quality, and delivery time. Therefore, by combining the system outcomes of both groups we cannot measure the system benefits obtained by each group correctly. Second, the measures of system success adopted in the previous researches have shortcoming in measuring the SCM success. User satisfaction, system utilization, and user attitudes toward the systems are most commonly used success measures in the existing studies. These measures have been developed as proxy variables in the studies of decision support systems (DSS) where the contribution of the systems to the organization performance is very difficult to measure. Unlike the DSS, the SCM systems have more specific goals, such as cost saving, inventory reduction, quality improvement, rapid time, and higher customer service. We maintain that more specific measures can be developed instead of proxy variables in order to measure the system benefits correctly. The purpose of this study is to find the determinants of SCM systems success in the perspective of vendor companies. In developing the research model, we have focused on selecting the success factors appropriate for the vendors through reviewing past researches and on developing more accurate success measures. The variables can be classified into following: technological, organizational, and environmental factors on the basis of TOE (Technology-Organization-Environment) framework. The model consists of three independent variables (competition intensity, top management support, and information system maturity), one mediating variable (collaboration), one moderating variable (government support), and a dependent variable (system success). The systems success measures have been developed to reflect the operational benefits of the SCM systems; improvement in planning and analysis capabilities, faster throughput, cost reduction, task integration, and improved product and customer service. The model has been validated using the survey data collected from 122 vendors participating in the SCM systems in Korea. To test for mediation, one should estimate the hierarchical regression analysis on the collaboration. And moderating effect analysis should estimate the moderated multiple regression, examines the effect of the government support. The result shows that information system maturity and top management support are the most important determinants of SCM system success. Supply chain technologies that standardize data formats and enhance information sharing may be adopted by supply chain leader organization because of the influence of focal company in the private industrial networks in order to streamline transactions and improve inter-organization communication. Specially, the need to develop and sustain an information system maturity will provide the focus and purpose to successfully overcome information system obstacles and resistance to innovation diffusion within the supply chain network organization. The support of top management will help focus efforts toward the realization of inter-organizational benefits and lend credibility to functional managers responsible for its implementation. The active involvement, vision, and direction of high level executives provide the impetus needed to sustain the implementation of SCM. The quality of collaboration relationships also is positively related to outcome variable. Collaboration variable is found to have a mediation effect between on influencing factors and implementation success. Higher levels of inter-organizational collaboration behaviors such as shared planning and flexibility in coordinating activities were found to be strongly linked to the vendors trust in the supply chain network. Government support moderates the effect of the IS maturity, competitive intensity, top management support on collaboration and implementation success of SCM. In general, the vendor companies face substantially greater risks in SCM implementation than the larger companies do because of severe constraints on financial and human resources and limited education on SCM systems. Besides resources, Vendors generally lack computer experience and do not have sufficient internal SCM expertise. For these reasons, government supports may establish requirements for firms doing business with the government or provide incentives to adopt, implementation SCM or practices. Government support provides significant improvements in implementation success of SCM when IS maturity, competitive intensity, top management support and collaboration are low. The environmental characteristic of competition intensity has no direct effect on vendor perspective of SCM system success. But, vendors facing above average competition intensity will have a greater need for changing technology. This suggests that companies trying to implement SCM systems should set up compatible supply chain networks and a high-quality collaboration relationship for implementation and performance.

브랜드애호도에 따른 가격할인율의 차이가 소비자의 획득가치와 거래가치에 미치는 영향 (The Effect of Price Discount Rate According to Brand Loyalty on Consumer's Acquisition Value and Transaction Value)

  • 김영이;김재영;신창락
    • 마케팅과학연구
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    • 제17권4호
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    • pp.247-269
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    • 2007
  • 현대에 있어 동질적인 품질과 편익을 제공하는 제품을 가지고 다수의 기업들이 시장점유율 증대와 고객확보를 위하여 치열한 경쟁을 벌이고 있는 가운데 가격할인은 기업이 즐겨 사용하는 촉진수단이다. 가격할인은 단기적 매출향상, 소비자의 브랜드전환, 신제품의 시장침투 등의 목적을 달성하기 위하여 사용된다. 실제로 과거의 실증연구에 의하면 다양한 형태의 가격할인이 판매증대에 효과적이며 가격할인은 소비자의 지각가치를 증가시킨다고 하였다. 하지만 할인된 가격은 제품의 품질을 의심하게 하거나 낮게 평가하는 부정적인 효과가 있다는 사실이 밝혀졌으며, 모든 제품카테고리와 모든 구매상황에 대하여 가격할인이 소비자의 지각가치를 향상시킨다고 볼 수 없다. 이에 따라 본 연구에서는 브랜드애호도의 차이가 있는 제품을 대상으로 가격할인율에 따라 소비자의 지각가치에 어떠한 영향을 미치는지를 연구함으로서 브랜드애호도의 조절효과를 분석하였다. 브랜드애호도가 강한 제품에 대한 지각획득가치와 지각거래가치는 가격할인율이 낮을 때 보다 큰 경우에 증가할 것으로 예측하였으나 분석결과 유의적인 차이가 없는 것으로 나타났는데, 이것은 브랜드애호도가 강한 경우에는 가격할인에 의한 지각희생의 감소량이 크지 않았고 브랜드 자체에 대한 신뢰도와 속성에 대한 만족도가 높기 때문에 가격인하가 브랜드선택에 큰 영향을 미치지 않았다는 것을 의미한다고 할 수 있다. 반면 브랜드애호도가 약한 제품에 대한 지각획득가치와 지각거래가치는 가격할인율이 낮을 때 보다 큰 경우에 감소한 것으로 나타났다. 이는 브랜드애호도가 약한 경우에는 제품으로부터 획득하게 되는 편익에 대한 만족도와 신뢰도가 낮은데 이러한 특성을 고려해보면 가격할인이 클 때에 제품의 품질과 편익을 더욱 평가절하하거나 심리적으로 지각희생의 크기가 증가됨에 따라 지각가치가 감소되었음을 의미한다고 할 수 있다.

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