[AISWorld] European Journal of Information Systems 21(3) is out. 5th article summary 'An empirical study of IS architectures in French SMEs: integration approaches'

[Myriam RAYMOND]

Dear IS colleagues,

http://www.palgrave-journals.com/ejis/index.html

The fifth article 'An empirical study of IS architectures in French SMEs:
integration approaches' co-authored by Marc Bidan and Frantz Rowe from
Université de Nantes and Duane Truex from Georgia State University,
clarifies an important theoretical construct often used but in different
senses: the IS architecture. The authors attempt to establish IS
architecture taxonomies with clear recognizable characteristics applicable
to the medium size firms through a study conducted over 143 French SMEs.
Through a multiple factoring statistical analysis tool, it identifies the
Silos Architecture category, the Partially Standardized Architecture
category, and the Hybrid Architecture category which is built on both
Enterprise Applications Integration tools and ERP systems. Finally, it
uncovers paths by which SMEs work on integrating their IS architecture.
The contributions of this article are twofold.  First, its theoretical
contribution concerns enhancing our understanding of a comprehensive
conceptualization of IS architecture. Second, the contribution of this
paper resides (1) in the description of their distribution in SMEs; (2) in
the absence of other integration/interoperability types in this
population; and (3) most importantly in the interpretation of the
organizational and historical rationale explaining the emergence of these
types.

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Myriam Raymond
Research Assistant & PhD Student
Université de Nantes