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Testing alternative theories of the firm: transaction cost, knowledge‐based, and measurement explanations for make‐or‐buy decisions in information services
Author(s) -
Poppo Laura,
Zenger Todd
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
strategic management journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 11.035
H-Index - 286
eISSN - 1097-0266
pISSN - 0143-2095
DOI - 10.1002/(sici)1097-0266(199809)19:9<853::aid-smj977>3.0.co;2-b
Subject(s) - transaction cost , corporate governance , economics , boundary (topology) , database transaction , new institutional economics , theory of the firm , empirical research , information economics , microeconomics , test (biology) , industrial organization , knowledge management , computer science , finance , mathematical analysis , paleontology , philosophy , mathematics , epistemology , programming language , biology
Firms boundary choices have undergone careful examination in recent years, particularly in information services. While transaction cost economics provides a widely tested explanation for boundary choice, more recent theoretical work advances competing knowledge‐based and measurement cost explanations. Similar to transaction cost economics, these theories examine the impact of exchange attributes on the performance of markets and hierarchies as institutions of governance. These theories, however, offer alternative attributes to those suggested by transaction cost economics or offer alternative mechanisms through which similar attributes influence make–buy choices. Traditional empirical specifications of make–buy models are unable to comparatively test among these alternative theories. By developing and testing a model of comparative institutional performance rather than institutional choice, we examine the degree of support for these competing explanations of boundary choice. Hypotheses are tested using data on the governance of nine information services at 152 companies. Our results suggest that a theory of the firm and a theory of boundary choice is likely to be complex, requiring integration of transaction cost, knowledge‐based, and measurement reasoning. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.