ISSN:1054-1721    

DOI:10.1080/10919399509540250

出版商:Taylor & Francis Group    

年代:1995

数据来源: Taylor

摘要:

Outsourcing of information systems functions has become a frequently chosen alternative of providing information systems services. This is true across many industries and all firm sizes. Practitioners have developed a number of guidelines relating to outsourcing. While many of these guidelines seem plausible their underlying economic reasons are often not identified because they are not based on any theory. We analyze outsourcing of information systems functions using the transaction cost economics framework. The framework allows us to incorporate production as well as coordination costs in evaluating the outsourcing option.

ISSN:1054-1721    

DOI:10.1080/10919399509540251

出版商:Taylor & Francis Group    

年代:1995

数据来源: Taylor

摘要:

The central management's decision to outsource an organization's information processing to an external supplier is studied. The internal computing resource is represented by a queuing model; its manager has private information about the department's cost and has objectives that may differ from those of the organization. Outsourcing decision rules are derived for both the cost center and profit center organizational forms for the internal department. With a cost center, the IS manager must report on the department's cost parameter, which models his or her private information, in order for the central management to make its decision; a mechanism design approach is used to ensure truthful reporting. The decision is shown to be quite complex, depending in part on the shape of the long‐run marginal cost function for the internal department, thus requiring considerable knowledge on the part of the central management. Full and no outsourcing are the most frequent outcomes, but partial outsourcing is optimal in one case. Various other implications are discussed, including the distortion of the decision caused by the information asymmetry and the beneficial effects of even the threat of outsourcing on the internal department's efficiency. In contrast, the decision rule for a profit center is very simple: The internal department should be retained as long as it can at least break even in the face of the external competition. Thus, very limited communication between the IS manager and central management suffices in this case. Again, full, partial, and no outsourcing are all possible as the optimal decision. The efficiency of the profit center can also be expected to be improved by the presence of the external source as the result of a reduction in its monopoly power.

ISSN:1054-1721    

DOI:10.1080/10919399509540252

出版商:Taylor & Francis Group    

年代:1995

数据来源: Taylor

摘要:

The U.S. airlines’ computerized reservations systems (CRSs) have frequently been cited as examples of the successful use of information technologies (TTs) for strategic purposes. Recent literature contains logical arguments and anecdotal evidence which suggest that the carriers that have invested in the systems have been able to use them, in concert with other operating and marketing strategies, to achieve competitive advantage. However, very little rigorous, model‐based empirical evidence has been brought to bear on this issue. The purpose of this article is to develop economic models for examining the business value of the CRSs and to provide empirical evidence regarding that value during the early 1980s. The modelling builds upon previous research aimed at estimating the business value of ITs and is gener‐alizable to estimating the value of ITs in other settings. We find that increases in the use of the CRSs were associated with more highly significant increases in their owners’ shares of air passenger traffic than reductions in the costs of reservations and sales labor and travel agent commissions. Also, the associations for the two leading CRSs, American's Sabre and United's Apollo, were stronger and more highly significant than those for Delta's DATASII, Eastern's SODA, and TWA's PARS.

ISSN:1054-1721    

DOI:10.1080/10919399509540253

出版商:Taylor & Francis Group    

年代:1995

数据来源: Taylor

摘要:

The emergence of “time‐based competition”; is making timeliness an increasingly important attribute of information systems in modern business organizations. This article focuses on the decision support role of information systems and examines the time value of information in delegated decision settings. We extend the principal‐agent model to incorporate the timing of information in the agent's decision‐making process. The analysis demonstrates that while more timely information results in higher value in the absence of incentive conflicts, more timely information is not necessarily more valuable in settings with incentive conflict. This potentially adverse impact of managerial incentives on the value of timeliness has to be considered in designing information systems. Consideration of user incentives may result in designing information systems that do not completely satisfy individual user “requirements,”; perhaps through suitable access restrictions.

ISSN:1054-1721    

DOI:10.1080/10919399509540254

出版商:Taylor & Francis Group    

年代:1995

数据来源: Taylor

摘要:

We develop a static two‐stage model of network externalities where the buyer has adequate information about the suppliers’ costs to join the network such that it is able to make differential subsidy payments. If the expected network size is small, suppliers encounter negative externalities as the buyer rewards the suppliers joining the system, but at a decreasing rate. On the other hand, if the expected network size is large, the buyer can exert increasing pressure on the few remaining suppliers to join the network, thus forcing positive externalities on these suppliers. We show that if the buyer can make differential subsidy payments, it may need to subsidize only a fraction of the nonjoiners up to a “spontaneous expansion point,”; after which the positive externalities force the remaining suppliers to join the network. We also examine a dynamic model where the suppliers’ costs to join the network decrease over time. We show that in this case, the buyer should incorporate a “bang‐bang”; strategy, such that after some specified time period the buyer should immediately pay for the costs to join the network of all suppliers needed to reach the spontaneous expansion point.

ISSN:1054-1721    

DOI:10.1080/10919399509540255

出版商:Taylor & Francis Group    

年代:1995

数据来源: Taylor

摘要:

Electronic financial markets use information technology to disseminate prices, quantities, and buyer and supplier identities. Increased visibility and market transparency have recognized benefits, but may introduce imperfections, and create profitable opportunities to “bypass”; established exchanges. In the U.S., dissemination of real‐time securities market information has equipped several firms to develop competing, off‐exchange trading mechanisms that rely on central market price data, but whose transactions bypass the established market. Significant trading away from the principal market may reduce market quality and increase transactions costs. A simulation model of trading in a continuous auction market (similar to the market structure of the New York Stock Exchange) is used to examine the effects of increasing levels of trading activity through an off‐exchange dealer. The results indicate competition from an alternative trading venue has mixed effects on the trading costs borne by investors—raising costs for some and lowering them for others. Contrary to U.S. regulatory goals, off‐market trading expands the role of profit‐seeking dealers and lowers the probability that some investors’ orders will execute.

ISSN:1054-1721    

DOI:10.1080/10919399509540256

出版商:Taylor & Francis Group    

年代:1995

数据来源: Taylor

ISSN:1054-1721    

DOI:10.1080/10919399509540249

出版商:Taylor & Francis Group    

年代:1995

数据来源: Taylor