Explaining Multisourcing Decisions in Application Outsourcing

Krancher, Oliver; Stürmer, Matthias (2018). Explaining Multisourcing Decisions in Application Outsourcing. In: Twenty-Sixth European Conference on Information Systems. Portsmouth, UK. 23.-28.06 2017.

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Multisourcing—the delegation of interdependent tasks to multiple vendors—is receiving increasing attention in practice and in research. Yet, we know little about the circumstances under which organizations choose multisourcing. In this paper, we draw on incomplete contracting theory and the knowledge-based view to explain multisourcing decisions in application projects. We test our model using a comprehensive dataset of 1093 sourcing decisions made by Swiss public organizations. The results provide strong support for the model. We find that clients choose multisourcing more frequently when (1) the project is large, (2) the software is client-specific and the project is large enough, (3) client and vendor lack joint experience, (4) the client seeks knowledge, (5) the technology is not proprietary, and (6) the client is experienced in outsourcing. While these findings support common views that clients choose multisourcing in response to opportunistic threats and to knowledge needs, the findings also shed light on prerequisites for multisourcing.

Item Type:

 Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)

Division/Institute:

 03 Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences > Department of Business Management > Institute of Information Systems > Information Management
03 Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences > Department of Business Management > Institute of Information Systems
03 Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences > Department of Business Management > Institute of Information Systems > Information Engineering

UniBE Contributor:

 Krancher, Oliver Jürgen, Stürmer, Matthias Emmanuel

Subjects:

 000 Computer science, knowledge & systems
600 Technology > 650 Management & public relations
300 Social sciences, sociology & anthropology > 330 Economics

Projects:

 [639] IT-Multisourcing Official URL

Language:

 English

Submitter:

 Oliver Jürgen Krancher

Date Deposited:

 07 May 2018 15:26

Last Modified:

 02 Mar 2023 23:30

Uncontrolled Keywords:

 Multisourcing; Multisourcing decision; Incomplete contracting theory; Property rights theory; Transaction cost economics; Knowledge-based view; Sourcing decision; asset specificity

BORIS DOI:

 10.7892/boris.114931

URI:

 https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/114931

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