Are Hubs The Centre Of Things? E-procurement In The Automotive Industry

Organizations are being confused by simplistic, technology-driven models of e-business that allegedly enhance competitive and co-operative capability. Re-examining the perceived wisdom of electronic markets finds shallow, overlapping networks competing for membership, isolated pockets of collaboration and irregular flows of revenue, resembling an ad-hoc arrangement of spokes rather than a hub structure. This paper develops a classification that highlights the link between inclusive/exclusive hub membership and the buyer-supplier relationship as part of planning eprocurement strategy. Three automotive case studies show that introducing electronic hubs without IS-related, industry-level planning simply speeds up the mess.