Factors affecting the adoption and diffusion of XML and Web services standards for E-business systems

Integration is a very important issue in e-business systems integration. There are three basic mechanisms to integrate diverse applications: data interchange, application program interfaces (API), and shared repositories. Standards and standardization efforts play important roles in all three areas. XML is a standard for defining data interchange standards. Web services are a set of standards for calling remote procedures over the Internet. UDDI and other e-business registries are examples of shared repositories. This paper discusses the XML and Web Services (including UDDI) standard-related technologies in the context of e-business systems. A technology adoption life cycle model is adapted to analyse various stages of standards adoption. Organizations that tend to adopt e-business standards in each stage are identified. Based on our study of e-business standards and research of relevant literatures, several factors that affect the adoption decision of e-business standards are identified. The implications of these factors are discussed. Two case studies of the implementation of e-business standards are presented. Further studies of how standards may affect the success of e-business strategies and how companies should evaluate and implement e-business standards are proposed. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.