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Internet
Technology and the Application Services Provider Business
IOM
590 Directed Research Project
Spring
2001
Prepared
by: Hari Gupta, MBA candidate
Faculty
Advisor: Professor C. Schlueter-Langdon
Marshall
School of Business
University
of Southern California
Project
Description
Application
Service Providers (ASPs) are an emerging category of firms, which provide
a variety of digital business support services using the Web.
These services range from the hosting of single applications
such as databases or software suites such as enterprise resource planning
(ERP) packages to supporting entire business processes such as corporate
sales (e.g., www.salesforce.com).
ASPs
may change the traditional business model of software companies: Subscription-based
sales may cannibalize or complement the sale of software packages.
Throughout
the economy ASPs may make it cheaper and easier for companies to pursue
specialization strategies or develop large business networks with many
participants and information system interfaces.
This
research is primarily descriptive and focuses on emerging ASP segments
and migration strategies. Based on these observations incentives of horizontal and vertical
integration will be investigated. This
analysis is based on transaction costs theory (Coase 1937; Williamson
1975) and its application in the information systems research literature
(Malone et al. 1987; Gurbaxani and Whang 1991).
Exemplary
Literature
Anderson,
P., and M. L. Tushman. 1990. Technological Discontinuities and Dominant
Designs: A Cyclical Model of
Technological Change. Administrative
Science Quarterly 35(4) December:
604-633.
Gurbaxani,
V., and S. Whang. 1991. The Impact Of Information Systems On Organization and Markets.
Communications of the ACM, Vol.
34 No. 1, 59-73.
Hitt,
L. M., 1999. Information Technology
and Firm Boundaries: Evidence from Panel Data. Information Systems Research,
June, Vol.10, No.2, 134-149.
Malone,
T. W., J., Yates, and R. I., Benjamin. 1987. Electronic Markets and Electronic Hierarchies.
Communications of the ACM, June, Vol. 30, No. 6, 484-497.
Scherer,
F. M., and D. Ross. 1990. Industrial Market Structure and Economic Performance. Houghton Mifflin Company: Boston.
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