M-Business Organizational Benefits and Value: A Qualitative Study

Abstract

Mobile technology innovations have allowed organizations to expand the way they conduct business. Organizations are increasingly leveraging the unique value propositions of mobile business (m-business) in terms of convenience, ubiquity, unison, and personalization to improve business performance and support their value chain activities. Building on a process-oriented model of IT business value, we propose that m-business value is derived from its perceived impacts on the value chain activities. This article addresses the following research questions: (i) How does m-business create value for organizations? and (ii) Which are the organizational impacts of m-business?

Through qualitative research involving in-depth interviews with experts, this article defines m-business value by clarifying the impacts of m-business usage at the organizational level. While the interview results show that m-business does have impact on marketing and sales and internal operations, its impact on procurement requires further research. The findings extend existing literature by proposing a definition of m-business value, based on a more in-depth understanding of m-business impacts on firm performance, highlighting new m-business value components, and developing a conceptual model of m-business value assessment in which task requirements and business characteristics may play a moderating role. The implications of these findings on future research are discussed.

Keywords:

• business process
• business value
• IT value
• m-business value
• mobile business

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This research was partially supported by the national funds of FCT—the Portuguese Science and Technology Foundation—within the strategic project PEst-OE/EGE/UI4027/2011.