The adoption of eCommerce communications and applications technologies in small businesses in New Zealand

This research investigates the impact of 10 factors, extended from the technological innovation literature, on the adoption of different eCommerce communications and applications technologies (EC) in small businesses (SMEs) in New Zealand (NZ). The research results showed that the CEO’s innovativeness was the only determinant of external-email adoption. CEO’s involvement was found to be the only determinant of Intranet adoption. Relative advantage and competition were found to influence Extranet/VPN adoption significantly and positively. However, support from technology vendors appeared to violate its hypothesised effect on Extranet/VPN adoption. Regression analysis found that pressure from suppliers was the only determinant of Internet-EDI adoption. The adoption of Web sites was influenced by the information intensity of products and the CEO’s innovativeness. The significant factors suggested the uniqueness of the adoption phenomenon in SMEs in NZ. However, the factors that appeared to be significant and the ones that appeared to be insignificant factors and the implications arising from these factors led to a conclusion which suggested the weakness of the EC adoption phenomenon in SMEs in NZ. The research discusses theoretical implications emerging from the research factors and portrays a path for future research.