Research Areas

• Strategic fit and alignment
• IT and E-commerce adoption in Asia
• B2B e-commerce
• Appropriateness of technology transfer
• National cultural theories
• Cultural Fit
• Interorganiational Theories

PhD Thesis

An investigation of the appropriateness of internet technology for inter-firm communication in the Thai tourism industry.

The advent of Internet technology by Western countries, particularly the US, has created a new hope for developing countries to reduce poverty and to bridge the digital divide gap between rich and poor countries which is a growing concern since the industrial revolution. As a result, developing countries, which have hoped to become a part of globalisation and to sustain competitive advantage in the new economy, emphasise on building technological infrastructure in order to transfer Internet technology to their countries. For example, APEC emphasised that East Asia countries must have a strong telecommunication infrastructure in order to attract business that aim at the global market. "Once the infrastructure is in place; it has to be sustained in the face of constant technology development" (APEC, 2002). However, questions arise if developing countries succeed in building these infrastructures and they are able to launch the same online service models as Western countries, will their local people use it? After a long term investment in national plans and strategies, education, infrastructures, where will this lead these nationals to and will they actually meet the net benefit from using an e-commerce model?
The ideas of this research have emerged from the gaps in literature reviews and the author's previous experience in interview and observation of around 20 organisations across different industries on e-commerce adoption in Thailand (Vatanasakdakul et al., 2004). Thailand business organisations and policy makers realised the importance of Internet technology and the adoption of Internet based applications for communication between business-to-business (B2B). However, it is often heard from the organisations that "I know that e-commerce is very important. I am now having the technology, but why it does not work?" This yields the problem of the appropriateness of B2B e-commerce technology transfer to Thailand, whether the B2B e-commerce is suitable to the local context and how this impacts on the organisation's performance. Thus, this research begins to investigate the appropriateness of B2B e-commerce technology transfer in Thai tourism industry.