An empirical investigation of competency factors affecting e-business success in European SMEs

In the last decade there was growing interest in strategic management literature about factors that influence a companyʹs ability to use IT. There is general consensus that knowledge and competency are necessary in developing an IT capability, but there is very little understanding of what the necessary competencies are, and how they influence IS usage in different contexts. The small and medium-sized enterprise context is particularly interesting for two reasons: it constitutes a major part of the economy and it has been relatively unsuccessful in exploiting e-business. We explored the relationship between e-business competency and its success in European SMEs. A literature review was used to determine factors representing e-business competency, and develop hypotheses, which were tested using data collected from 339 SMEs in Europe. Our results provide evidence on the importance of certain e-business competencies on e-business success, and have implications for both research and practice in the field of SMEs.