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Introduction Strategic relevance of knowledge has been widely recognized for about two decades (Grant, 1996b; Nonaka, 1991; Sambamurthy, Bharadwaj, & Grover, 2003). The increased interest on knowledge has focused organizations on skills that enable knowledge creation, diffusion and exploitation. One of these skills is absorptive capacity, a "dynamic capability" that allows organizational knowledge creation and utilization (Zahra & George, 2002). It enables organizations to recognize the value of new external knowledge, assimilate it and apply it to commercial ends (Cohen & Levinthal, 1990). Considering absorptive capacity as a "dynamic capability" implies that it is an essentially strategic capability (Teece, Pisano, & Shuen, 1997), and that it is conceived to influence organizational changes and, therefore, to define the firm's future organizational evolution (Zahra & George, 2002). According to Lane, Koka, and Pathak (2002), one of the most salient shortcomings of absorptive capacity literature is the little attention paid to the actual processes underlying its formation, i.e. its antecedents. Additionally, it is interesting to observe that the antecedents identified in literature are distinctly--and in part wrongfully--skewed towards those that enable tacit knowledge creation, whereas explicit knowledge generation is relegated or simply omitted. This tendency, which ignores the symbiotic relations existing among both knowledge types (Nonaka, 1994), has led to exclude from the identified antecedents the set of resources and capabilities associated to IS/IT. These are one of the most widely expanded and utilized sets of technologies in today's business world. Thus, an influential avenue to organizational strategic success might have been ignored so far. Consequently, the objective of this article is to develop the arguments that justify considering IS/IT resources as an antecedent of absorptive capacity and to highlight the links between these resources and the most important antecedents already recognized in literature. This paper contributes to the knowledge of absorptive capacity antecedents by emphasizing the need to refine the focus of search for relevant antecedents. An effective set of antecedents should target to joint, efficient, and balanced development of tacit and explicit knowledge. Besides, we identify an overlooked group of antecedents and underline the reach and value of their contribution to absorptive capacity generation. We then incorporate this set of antecedents in an already accepted model depicting absorptive capacity formation and effects. This paper is organized as follows: in the next paragraph we portray the strategic value of IS/IT resources. Then, we review the literature on absorptive capacity and its antecedents. Next, we analyze the effects of considering IS/IT resources as antecedents of absorptive capacity. Finally, we propose integrating IS/IT resources within the Model of Determinants of Absorptive Capacity. IS/IT Resources from an RBV Perspective During the mid 1980s and based on earlier organizational strategy theories, such as Nelson and Winter's work (1982), the resource-based approach to strategic analysis started to unfold. This perspective suggests analyzing organizational outcomes based on the possession, control or utilization of a specific set of resources (Garcia & Navas, 2004). The resource based view of the firm (RBV) states that enterprise resources and capabilities may be understood as a collection of elements, factors, assets, skills and attributes, possessed or controlled by firms, which enable them to formulate and implement a competitive strategy (Navas & Guerras, 1998). Within this context, many authors have referred to IS/IT resources as an important means to contribute to enterprise objective accomplishment. It has been argued that these resources may influence competitive positioning (Griffiths & Finlay, 2004) and may provide access to competitive advantages (Hirshheim & Sabherwal, 2001). …

Valuing IS/IT Resources as an Antecedent of Ab-sorptive Capacity: An RBV Perspective