A framework for adoption intention of open source enterprise resource planning systems by small and medium size enterprises at Yemen

Abstract

Small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) represent a significant contributor towards countries’ economic activities. SMEs need to use enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems to increase revenue and productivity. Because of the high cost of the license of these systems, open source ERP (OSERP) may solve this issue. When adopting ERP, SMEs faced several issues, including inadequate training, insufficient support by vendor, government, top management, low level of employee's skills and culture, cost of implementation, internet, and infrastructures. These issues have caused a low level of ERP adoption. This study aimed to develop a framework for intention to adopt OSERP by SMEs in Yemen. It determined the impact of factors information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure, ICT skills, security, top management, organizations culture, and cost-saving, competitive pressure, vendor support, relative advantage, complexity, compatibility, trialability, and observability variables on intention to adopt OSERP by SMEs in Yemen. It also determined the moderating impact of regulatory support on the relation of system characteristics, technological, organizational, and environmental variables to the intention to adopt OSERP by SMEs in Yemen. The primary data were collected using a questionnaire distributed to 600 respondents randomly selected from 4600 SMEs in Sana’a, Yemen. The study results revealed that the observability, compatibility, and regulatory support had a high and positive impact on SMEs' intention to adopt OSERP in Yemen. Besides, complexity had a negative impact on the intention to adopt OSERP by SMEs in Yemen. However, there was no impact of organizational culture and security on intention to adopt OSERP by SMEs in Yemen. Furthermore, this study found that no moderating impact for regulatory support on the relationship between the independent variables and intention to adopt OSERP by SMEs in Yemen. The implications included in the study provide increased awareness of the factors that influence OSERP adoption intention by SMEs in Yemen.