A Theoretical and Empirical Investigation of the Role of Firm Technology Investments and Sourcing Practices in Business Innovation.

Management Information Systems;Information Technology;Innovation;Information Systems;Economics;Business;Business Administration

Cherian, Sajeev PlammoottilOlson, Judith Spencer ;

University of Michigan

关键词: Management Information Systems;    Information Technology;    Innovation;    Information Systems;    Economics;    Business;    Business Administration;   

Others  :  https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/95962/scherian_1.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

瑞士|英语

来源: The Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship

【 摘 要 】

The core thesis of my dissertation is that the information technology and sourcing practices of firms affect how innovative those firms are in the long run.In the first chapter of my dissertation I develop a theoretical model of firm-level innovation that asserts that firms can exploit strategic, organizational and technological levers to encourage innovation.The model I build leverages findings from prior management and MIS research.I then utilize the Interpretive Systems View of Organizations (Daft & Weick, 1984) to understand how information technology and firm sourcing practices specifically might affect firm-level innovation and define a research agenda that proposes a set of research questions to guide this area of inquiry.In the second chapter I explore a subset of the research questions defined in Chapter 1 by exploring how IT investments affect a firm’s ability to innovate. I develop hypotheses suggesting both direct and indirect (through increasing returns to R&D investment) effects of IT investment on innovative output in high-tech firms.I test my hypotheses on an unbalanced panel of large US high-tech firms from 1998 - 2003 with patent, financial and IT investment data compiled from the US Patents & Trademarks Office, COMPUSTAT and Informationweek surveys.I find strong support for the direct effects of IT investment on innovative output but not for a positive indirect effect.These findings contribute to the existing literature on the business value of information systems by identifying another significant way in which IT investments add value to firms.In the third chapter I evaluate whether externally-facing IT investments and different types of sourcing practices are associated with higher levels of innovation in high-tech firms. I test my hypotheses on an unbalanced panel of large US high-tech firms from 2003 - 2007 with patent, financial, sourcing and IT investment data compiled from the US Patents & Trademarks Office, COMPUSTAT and Informationweek surveys.I find support for customer-facing IT investments being associated with higher innovative output but not supplier-facing IT investments.Additionally I find that business process outsourcing is associated with higher levels of firm innovation while IT outsourcing is not.