Technological change [Elektronische Ressource] : an analysis of the diffusion and implications of e-business technologies / von Philipp Köllinger

Microsoft Corporation

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• Publié par: humboldt-universitat_zu_berlin
• Publié le: 01 janvier 2006
• Nombre de lectures: 49
• Langue: Deutsch
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

D I S S E R T A T I O N
Technological change:
An analysis of the diffusion and
implications of e-business technologies
zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades
doctor rerum politicarum
(Doktor der Wirtschaftswissenschaft)
eingereicht an der
Wirtschaftswissenschaftlichen Fakultät
der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
von
Master of Science in Economics and Management
Philipp Köllinger
Dekan: Prof. Dr. Joachim Schwalbach
Gutachter: 1. Prof. Dr. Christian Schade
2. Prof. Dr. Christian Wey
eingereicht: 29. Juli 2005
Tag des Kolloquiums: 07. Februar 2006
2
Zusammenfassung
Die vorliegende Dissertation beschäftigt sich hauptsächlich mit zwei Fragen: Erstens, welche Faktoren beein-
flussen den Prozess, durch den sich neue Technologien unter Firmen verbreiten? Zweitens, welche Konsequen-
zen ergeben sich aus der Verbreitung neuer Technologien? Beide Fragen beschäftigen sich mit der Dynamik des
technologischen Wandels. Die Analyse wird am konkreten Beispiel von e-Business Technologien durchgeführt.
Dabei werden insbesondere die Konsequenzen von interdependenten Technologien untersucht. Es wird ge-
zeigt, dass es zu steigenden Erträgen der Adoption kommen kann, wenn verwandte Technologien sich nicht in
ihren Funktionalitäten substituieren. Dies kann zu einer endogenen Beschleunigung der technologischen Ent-
wicklung führen. Dies bedeutet, dass die Wahrscheinlichkeit der Adoption einer Technologie mit der Anzahl der
zuvor adoptierten, verwandten Technologien ansteigt. Diese Theorie wird empirisch getestet und in vier ver-
schiedenen Untersuchungen mit zwei verschiedenen, großen Datensätzen bestätigt. Die Existenz einer wachsen-
den digitalen Kluft in der e-Business Technologie-Ausstattung der Unternehmen wird für den Zeitraum von
1994-2002 nachgewiesen.
Außerdem wird argumentiert, dass die Adoption neuer Technologien in Firmen strategische Bedeutung hat da
sich daraus Möglichkeiten zur Durchführung von Innovationen ergeben. Diese können sich entweder durch re-
duzierte Produktionkosten für bestehende Produkte, neue Produkte und Dienstleistungen, oder neue Distributi-
onskanäle manifestieren. Empirische Evidenz zeigt, dass e-Business Technologien derzeit wichtige Enabler von
Innovationen sind und dass innovative Firmen mit höherer Wahrscheinlichkeit wachsen. Außerdem wird ge-
zeigt, dass durch e-Business Technologien induzierte Innovationen gegenüber anderen Innovationsarten nicht
inferior sind in Bezug auf deren gleichzeitiges Auftreten mit finanziellen Leistungsindikatoren.
Die Arbeit diskutiert die Implikationen dieser Ergebnisse aus volks- und betriebswirtschaftlicher Perspektive.

Schlagworte: Technologischer Wandel, Innovation, Diffusion, Adoption, verwandte Technologien, endo-
gene Beschleunigung, e-business, IKT, Wettbewerbsfähigkeit, Performanz
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Abstract

This dissertation primarily deals with two questions: First, what determines the process by which new tech-
nologies spread among enterprises over time? Second, what are the consequences of the spread of new tech-
nologies? Both questions concern the dynamics of technological change. They are analyzed considering the
diffusion and implications of e-business technologies as a concrete example.
Particular attention is given to technological interdependencies. It is shown that increasing returns to adoption
can arise if related technologies do not substitute each other in their functionalities. This can lead to an endoge-
nous acceleration of technological development. Hence, the probability to adopt any technology is an increasing
function of previously adopted, related technologies. The theory is empirically tested and supported in four in-
dependent inquiries, using two different exceptionally large datasets and different econometric methods. The
existence of a growing digital divide among companies is demonstrated for the period between 1994 and 2002.
In addition, it is argued that the adoption of new e-business technologies by firms has strategic relevance be-
cause this creates opportunities to conduct innovation, either to reduce production costs for a given output, to
create a new product or service, or to deliver products to customers in a way that is new to the enterprise. Em-
pirical evidence is presented showing that e-business technologies are currently an important enabler of innova-
tions. It is found that innovative firms are more likely to grow. Also, e-business related innovations are not
found to be inferior to traditional kinds of innovations in terms of simultaneous occurrence with superior finan-
cial performance of enterprises.
Implications of these findings are discussed both for economists and management researchers.

Keywords: Technological change, innovation, diffusion, adoption, related technologies, endogenous ac-
celeration, e-business, ICT, firm performance, competitive advantage 4

Acknowledgments

I am thankful to my supervisor Christian Schade who has inspired this thesis with many ideas and has pro-
vided me with motivation and critical expert monitoring of my work for the last three years. Many thanks for
helpful comments and suggestions also go to Christian Wey, Pio Baake, Wolfgang Härdle, Maria Minniti, Sönke
Albers, and the audience at various conferences and work-shops where parts of this work were presented. I am
also thankful to DIW Berlin for giving me the opportunity to write this thesis, Ingrid Wernicke and Tobias
Krebs for technical assistance, Brigitte Preissl and Daniel Nepelski for helping me out with project duties, and to
the European Commission for granting me access to the e-Business Market W@tch database. Last but not least,
my family and my friends have supported me essentially in many ways. 5

Contents


INDEX OF TABLES 7
INDEX OF FIGURES 9
ABBREVIATIONS 10

PART I
1. INTRODUCTION 1
1.1. Purpose 1
1.2. Contributions 2
1.3. Outline 2
1.4. Terminology 3
1.4.1. Innovation 3
1.4.2. Adoption and diffusion 5
1.4.3. Technological progress 5
1.4.4. E-business 7
2. CONSEQUENCES OF TECHNOLOGICAL DIFFUSION 11
2.1. Technology and the supply function 11
2.2. Appropriability problems 12
2.3. Market structure 14
2.3.1. Economies of scale 15
2.3.2. Economies of scope 16
2.3.3. Network externalities 17
2.3.4. Market structure and innovation incentives 18
2.3.5. Innovation and market structure 20
2.3.6. Technological competition 21
2.3.7. Other dynamic factors 22
2.4. Productivity and growth 24
2.5. Firm performance 26
2.6. Employment effects 28
2.7. Implications for e-business diffusion 30
3. THEORIES OF TECHNOLOGICAL DIFFUSION 33
3.1. Different perspectives on innovation diffusion 33
3.2. Economic theory of technology adoption 34
3.2.1. Epidemic effects 35
3.2.2. Rank effects 36
3.2.3. Stock effects 37
3.2.4. Order effects 39
3.2.5. Risk and uncertainty 40
3.3. Empirical results from the IO literature 41
3.4. Management literature on technology adoption 42
3.5. Multiple related technologies and development paths 45
3.6. Implications for e-business diffusion 51
3.7. The process of technological change 54

PART II

4. DATA DESCRIPTION 58
5. STATIC ANALYSIS OF E-BUSINESS ADOPTION 65
5.1. Theory 65
5.2. A logistic model of technology adoption 68
5.3. A simultaneous equation model of technology adoption 77 6
5.4. CART – identification of clusters with different adoption probabilities 83
5.5. Discussion 89
6. DYNAMIC ANALYSIS OF E-BUSINESS DIFFUSION 92
6.1. Discrete time hazard rate model with unobserved heterogeneity 92
6.2. Empirical results 97
6.3. Growing digital divide 106
6.4. Discussion 108
7. E-BUSINESS, INNOVATION, AND FIRM PERFORMANCE 110
7.1. Does IT matter? 110
7.2. Theoretical background 111
7.3. An error component model of firm performance 112
7.4. Empirical results 114
7.5. Discussion 121

PART III
8. SUMMARY 124
9. IMPLICATIONS AND FURTHER RESEARCH 126
REFERENCES 129
APPENDIX 1 – CART 148 2 – ADDITIONAL CART RESULTS 151
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Index of tables

Table 1 - Examples of e-business solutions for various functions of the firm 9
Table 2 – Overview of hypotheses 53
Table 3 – Incentive scheme to Figure 3 56
Table 4 – Theories relating to technological change 56
Table 5 – Country-sector coverage e-Business W@tch survey July 2002 59
Table 6 – Sector definition of e-Business W@tch survey July 2002 59
Table 7 - Country-sector coverage e-Business W@tch survey March 2003 60
Table 8 - Sector definition of e-Business W@tch survey March 2003 61
Table 9 - Country-sector coverage e-Business W@tch survey Nov/Dec 2003 61
Table 10 - Sector definition of e-62
Table 11 – Features of the three cross-sectional datasets 63
Table 12 – Relative frequency of 11 related e-business technologies 69
Table 13 – Logit regression results for 4 e-business technologies (k as integer) 71
Table 14 - Logit regression results for 4 e-business technologies (k as integer) 72
Table 15 - Logit regression results for 3 e-business technologies (k