An investigation of the benefits and barriers of e‐business adoption activities in Yemeni SMEs

AuthorEoin Plant,Brychan Thomas,Ahmed Abdullah,Lyndon Murphy
DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1002/jsc.2195
Published date01 May 2018
Date01 May 2018
RESEARCH ARTICLE
DOI: 10.1002/jsc.2195
Strategic Change. 2018;27(3):195–208. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/jsc © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 195
Abstract
Yemeni small‐ and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) are at the early stages of e‐business adop‐
on and their owners and managers need to be supported to gain an understanding of the ben
ets that their business can achieve from adopng e‐business. Yemeni SMEs are at the early
stages of e‐business adopon. The delay in adopng more advanced e‐business soluons are
due to factors including the comparavely low level of technology usage within the organizaon,
lack of qualied sta available to develop, implement and support rms’ websites, and limited
nancial resources. A lack of computer soware and hardware resources appears to have a det
rimental eect on e‐business adopon amongst Yemeni SMEs.
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
Increasingly, in both developed and developing countries, small‐ and
medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) are becoming even more important
to naonal economies due to their strategic signicance in develop
ing dierent industrial sectors worldwide (Maad & Liedholm, 2008).
Therefore, it may be argued that SMEs play a major role in an econ
omy by signicantly contribung to the enhancement of the countries’
gross domesc product and its labor force by creang more job oppor
tunies and developing skilled labor. The integraon of informaon
and communicaon technology (ICT) can have a signicant impact
within such organizaons and their employees with improved produc
vity, and subsequent lowering of unit costs (Andam, Programme, &
Force, 2003). Further, it is considered that one of the most impor‐
tant strategies that can eecvely help SMEs to enhance their busi
ness performance is the ulizaon of ICT (Pickernell et al., 2013; Tan,
Chong, Lin, & Eze, 2009). ICT can provide SMEs with several com
peve advantages such as integrang supply chain partners, orga
nizaonal funcons, and oering crical informaon at the right me
(Sharma & Sheth, 2010). The adopon of ICT and e‐business may oer
organizaons more ecient resource management as well as making
rms’ communicaon faster (OECD, 2004). However, there are barri
ers for SMEs adopng e‐business such as cost, size, and skilled labor
(Middleton, 2011). The development of the worldwide economy and
increase of e‐business acvity has led it to become an important com
ponent of business strategy and economic development (Al‐Mar,
2008). Indeed, rapid development has been witnessed in the world
within dierent aspects of life, especially the technological revoluon
such as e‐business. For instance, there is widespread use of the Inter‐
net in every aspect and phase of business (Al‐Mar, 2008).
The Yemen e‐commerce sector has witnessed rapid growth and
has exceeded expectaons, and become a new way of shopping com
pared with previous years (Almotamar, 2014). In the last year, the rst
electronic store website was established called the Warzan company
and became arguably the best e‐commerce site in Yemen (Almotamar,
2014). Although there are many individuals using Facebook pages to
promote their products, those pages do not have sucient condence
for transacons to take place due to not being considered an enty
and not ocially registered compared to the Warzan Company which
is a registered company and has earned the condence of consumers
(Almotamar, 2014). This study develops an evoluon measurement
model based on the e‐adopon ladder model. The e‐adopon model
has been used by a number of researchers and this approach is a “step‐
by‐step” process which starts with email communicaon then with
basic website, ecommerce, e‐business unl the point of the trans
formed organizaon (Hoque, 2000; Jones, Hecker, & Holland, 2003;
Parish et al., 2002; Teo & Pian, 2004; Vosloo, 2003; Willcocks & Sauer,
2000). The model developed here is an extension to the e‐adopon
ladder model which included new factors (social media, cloud services,
and mobile applicaon). Those added factors were gathered from the


1123
1Faculty of Business and Society, University
of South Wales, Newport, United Kingdom
2Cardi School of Management, Cardi
Metropolitan University, Cardi, United
Kingdom
3School of Transport Engineering,
Environment and Planning, Dublin Instute
of Technology, Dublin, Ireland

Ahmed Abdullah, University of South Wales,
Newport City Campus, South Wales NP20
2BP, UK.
Email: ahmed.abdullah@southwales.ac.uk
* JEL classicaon codes: M15.

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