The antecedents and outcomes of a firm's Internet-enable electronic supply chain integration participation

Abstract

Fostering Internet-enabled Supply Chain Integration (IeSCI) has been widely regarded as a critical factor for firm success. However, although the benefits of IeSCI have been widely proposed theoretically, the fact is that IeSCI is still seemingly rare in the real world, and many firms engaged in it have not reaped the expected performance benefits. Meanwhile, there is a great lack of systematic theoretical and empirical understanding of the antecedents which can drive firms to engage in IeSCI, and of how such integration helps firms improve performance. This study aims to derive a syncretic model to explain the underlying mechanisms of the process of IeSCI development and the influences of IeSCI on firm performance. Drawing upon existing literature and the process perspective, this study conceptualizes IeSCI into four integration degrees: online information integration, online planning synchronization, online operational coordination, and strategic partnership. Furthermore, based on the lens of the diffusion of innovation theory, institutional theory, and dynamic capability theory, the study identifies three groups of factors related to firms’ motivation, opportunity, and ability as prominent antecedents of the overall intensity and the four degrees of IeSCI with the Motivation-Opportunity-Ability (MOA) paradigm. Specifically, the study hypothesizes how efficiency motive, exploration motive, agility motive, complementarities motive, partner power, partner digitization, competition intensity, IT capabilities, and absorptive capacity influence IeSCI, and how the overall intensity and the four degrees of IeSCI separately impact firm operational, customer service, and business performance. Using data from 277 firms in China, the study finds that all identified antecedents, except exploration motive, significantly drive the overall intensity of IeSCI. The study also shows that the influences of the antecedents vary across the four degrees of integration: (1) for online information integration, the key antecedents are efficiency motive, complementarities motive, partner power, partner digitization, absorptive capacity, and IT capabilities; (2) for online planning synchronization, the critical antecedents are all factors related to opportunity and ability. No motives have significant impacts; (3) for online operational coordination, the important antecedents are agility motive, partner promotion, partner digitization, absorptive capacity, and IT capabilities. Noteworthy is that the impact of the exploration motive on online operational coordination is negative; (4) for strategic partnerships, only agility motive, partner promotion, competition intensity, and absorptive capacity act as significant antecedents. The research also finds that the overall intensity of IeSCI significantly improves firm operational, customer service, and business performance. The results indicate that these four degrees of integration play different roles in improving firm performance. Specifically, online information integration only improves customer service, and online planning synchronization only impacts business performance. Comparably, online operational coordination and strategic partnership improves all three aspects of performance. Implications and suggestions for future research are provided.