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Information Architecture and Electronic Market Performance OTTO R. KOPPIUS Information Architecture and Electronic Market Performance 0 90 10 Ronde Munt 1 EUR Stw Eenh/Stw Aantal Aant/Eenh 80 20 16 XX5 13 30 Min. Aant. 1 KoperNr. 70 30 313 Gek. Aant. 7 60 40 50 INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE AND ELECTRONIC MARKET PERFORMANCE ii INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE AND ELECTRONIC MARKET PERFORMANCE Informatie-architectuur en de prestatie van elektronische markten Proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam op gezag van de Rector Magnificus Prof.dr.ir. J.H. van Bemmel en volgens besluit van het College voor Promoties. De openbare verdediging zal plaatsvinden op donderdag 16 mei 2002 om 13.30 uur door Otto Rogier Koppius geboren te Amsterdam iii Promotiecommissie Promotoren: Prof.mr.dr. P.H.M. Vervest Prof.dr.ir. H.W.G.M. van Heck Overige leden: Prof.dr.ir. J.A.E.E. van Nunen Prof.dr. M.H. Rothkopf Prof.dr. K. Kumar Erasmus Research Institute of Management (ERIM) Erasmus University Rotterdam Internet: http://www.erim.eur.nl ERIM Ph.D. Series Research in Management 13 TRAIL Thesis Series T2002 / 3, The Netherlands, Trail Research School ISBN 90 – 5892 – 023 - 2 © 2002, Otto Koppius All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author. iv Aan mijn ouders v vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The thing that perhaps surprised me most in the past four-and-a-half years is that doing a Ph.D. is by no means the solitary process of the lonely graduate student in his office behind a computer that people tend to associate with it. Consequently, there are a number of people whose contribution to this dissertation deserves recognition. First, I am grateful to my supervisors and the Erasmus Research Institute of Management for taking a chance with someone who did not quite fit the profile of a prototypical management Ph.D. student. From the first day I arrived here, I’ve felt quite at home. To no small extent can this be attributed to the fellow Ph.D. students that started at the same time, several of which have become good friends. Particularly with my roommate for the first six months, Leon Peeters, we joked around so much that I dare not think what had happened to our productivity if we had not gotten separate offices. As a group, the ‘Class of 97’ developed a cohesion that provided a lot of laughs during the highs and intellectual and emotional support during the lows, thanks! It looks like the prediction we made on a winter night in The Hague late 1997 was 100% accurate. Also, special thanks to AnneMarie Stolkwijk and Tineke van der Vhee for taking good care of us Ph.D. students. Another important factor that made me feel at home, was the pleasant working environment with colleagues at the department of Decision and Information Sciences and the many opportunities the department provides. This was one of the reasons why the decision for me to continue as an assistant professor here was an easy one to make. The main reason to stay on though, was that I would be able to continue my collaboration with Eric van Heck. To have a supervisor who allows you such freedom to pursue your own research angle is unusual. To have one who supports his Ph.D. students the way he does (a lot of it behind the scenes where he thinks we will not notice, but we most certainly do!) is already very rare. But to have one with whom you also work together so productively and pleasantly is unique indeed. I look forward to continuing our joint work for many more years to come. vii Sometimes while doing your research, you feel like what you are doing is insignificant, but whenever I heard my other supervisor, Peter Vervest, talk about my research, I came away energized by his enthusiasm. Even though I may not always have agreed with his suggestions, they have always stimulated my thinking. His ability to see the practical side of academic research is a quality that I will try to emulate. Throughout the course of my research I have benefited from the help of so many people, that listing all of them would be impossible. The tip of the iceberg is formed by the indispensable network of the Edispuut, whose sometimes brutal, yet always constructive remarks have strengthened many theses, including mine. Early on in my research, Michael Mol and I embarked on a joint project about electronic sourcing strategy. The discussions with him were invaluable in facilitating my understanding of the management literature, as well as providing me with a good friend in the process. The Carnegie-Bosch Institute provided generous funding for our project, which facilitated a visit from me to the AI Lab University of Michigan that proved to be crucial for the direction my research has taken. This was further developed during a visit to IBM’s Institute for Advanced Commerce, which formed a solid basis for chapter 5. I want to thank all three organizations for their generosity and hospitality. During my time in the US I got in contact with Michael Rothkopf, whose refreshing views on auction theory have been very influential in my thinking and I am honored to have him on my thesis committee. I also want to thank my other committee members, Jo van Nunen and Kuldeep Kumar, for the feedback they have given on my work at various points in time. Doctoral consortia are without a doubt one of the most useful institutions around for Ph.D. students. I want to thank students and faculty at those of ICIS ‘99 and the Academy of Management TIM/OCIS ’00 for their feedback and providing me with the confidence regarding the direction of my research. Throughout my research, I’ve enjoyed working with several students. Reiant Mulder’s assistance in collecting the data for chapter 4 has helped me enormously. viii Ben Leijdekkers’ help in building the multidimensional auction prototype, as well as the many stimulating discussions we had, were indispensable for the work in chapter 5. If it hadn’t been for Gerard and Lucie Dulfer, I would probably still be staring at a blank piece of paper, as they provided me several times with an inspiring environment for me to write. Thank you very much. I can only do justice to Matthijs ‘Mezzo’ Wolters by using exactly this amount of words to show what league he is in. Finally, I want to thank my family. In my M.Sc. thesis, I compared you to the giants in Isaac Newton’s famous saying about him ‘standing on the shoulders of giants’. The fact that you are holding this thesis in your hands right now is evidence of just how gigantic you are. Otto Koppius Rotterdam, March 2002 ix x TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements ............................................................................................ VII Chapter 1 : Introduction And Research Questions ............................................ 1 1.1 MARKETS, AUCTIONS AND THE INTERNET ................................................... 1 1.2 RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND OBJECTIVE........................................................ 6 1.3 METHODOLOGY............................................................................................ 12 1.4 SCIENTIFIC RELEVANCE ............................................................................... 13 1.5 MANAGERIAL RELEVANCE .......................................................................... 15 1.6 STRUCTURE OF THIS DISSERTATION............................................................ 16 Chapter 2 : Literature Survey ............................................................................ 17 2.1 INTRODUCTION............................................................................................. 17 2.2 ICT AND THE CHOICE OF COORDINATION MECHANISM ............................ 17 2.3 ICT AND MARKET PROCESSES .................................................................... 20 2.4 NEW ELECTRONIC MARKET INSTITUTIONS.................................................. 23 2.5 SUMMARY .................................................................................................... 25 Chapter 3 : Product Quality Information In Electronic Auctions .................. 27 3.1 INTRODUCTION............................................................................................. 27 3.2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND ...................................................................... 28 3.3 THE SCREEN AUCTIONING INITIATIVE......................................................... 30 3.4 DATA AND METHODOLOGY......................................................................... 35 3.5 RESULTS ....................................................................................................... 38 3.6 DISCUSSION.................................................................................................. 39 3.7 CONCLUSIONS .............................................................................................. 41 Chapter 4 : Market State Information In Electronic Auctions ....................... 43 4.1 INTRODUCTION............................................................................................. 43 4.2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND ...................................................................... 45 4.3 THE BUYING-AT-A-DISTANCE INITIATIVE .................................................. 46 4.4 DATA AND METHODOLOGY......................................................................... 49 4.5 RESULTS ......................................................................................................
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