Mission critical Open Source Software (OSS) adoption by organizations is relatively new and the research field related to the issue is new as well. Professor Placide Poba-Nzaou (UQÀM) and his research team used the Delphi method to investigate barriers to mission-critical OSS adoption as perceived by two panels of experienced providers in France and in Quebec, Canada. The open source adoption literature is therefore complemented by adding new insights to the existing body of knowledge dominated by client perspective alone.
* This presentation is published by courtesy or Pr Placide Pobia-N'zaou.
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Barriers to Mission Critical Open Source Software Adoption
1. Barriers to Mission-Critical OSS
Adoption by Organizations: A
Provider Perspective
Dr Placide Poba-Nzaou
Professor
School of Management (ESG)
Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)
poba-nzaou.placide@uqam.ca
Open source Event
Wednesday, June 5, 2013 from 1:00 PM to 7:00 PM (EDT)
Centre Pierre-Péladeau (Salon Orange) 300, boulevard De Maisonneuve Est,
Montréal, Québec H2X 3X6 , Canada
2. Source
Poba-Nzaou, P. & Uwizeyemungu, S. "Barriers to
Mission-Critical Open Source Software
Adoption by Organizations: A Provider
Perspective". 19th Americas Conference on
Information Systems (AMCIS), Chicago, United
States, August 15-17, 2013, 10 pages
(forthcoming)
4. ICT
Industry
Software
Industry
OSS
Industry
Increasing
role in the economy of dev. Countries:
10% of GDP
> 50% of economic growth (UNU-MERIT, 2006)
Key element driving ICT sector
Critical for almost every company’ performance
(McKinsey, 2013)
Global trade in IP licences > 900 billions US $/year
= 5% of world trade (Hargreaves, 2011)
Potential to strongly affect: structure, competitiveness,
and performance of ICT industry (Merrill Lynch, 2001)
One of the most important IT trends in the 21st century
(Forrester, 2007)
Contribution to Europe’s economy: 450 billion Euro /year
(Daffara, 2012)
Multiple implications: cultural, economic, societal,
technological, legal, ethical, moral, and political
Introduction
5. OSS (http://opensource.org/osd)
Software that is licensed under an open source
license
The source code is available to everybody and can
be used, modified and redistributed with or without
condition
Examples of OSS licenses
Apache License 2.0
BSD (Berkeley software distribution license)
GNU General Public License (GPL)
MIT license
Mozilla Public License, etc.
Introduction
6. OSS phenomenon has grown beyond
infrastructure software
It has now reached the domain of mission-critical
software
Definition of mission-critical software
“Business applications, excluding email, that would
bring a company to a stop if they were not
running” (IDC, 2009, p. 3)
Introduction
7. Examples of mission-critical OSS
ERP (enterprise resource planning)
E.g.: OpenERP, ERP5, Compiere, OpenBravo, OfBiz
CRM (customer relationship management)
E.g.: SugarCRM, VTiger, CiviCRM
Electronic Medical or Health Record (EMR, EHR)
E.g.: OpenEMR, Oscar, Open Vista, OpenEHR,
Cristal-Net
Introduction
8. A number of OSS characteristics make OSS
particularly attractive to organizations
The potential for reducing the total cost of
ownership (Bradbury, 2006)
No vendor lock-ins (Nagy et al., 2010)
Use of open standards (opensource.org)
Introduction
9. Several governments around the world
Have set up initiatives or even legislate in favor of
OSS adoption (CSIS, 2010)
Belgium, Brazil, China, France, Germany, Ghana,
Japan, South Africa, The UK, The US, Taiwan, etc.
A survey conducted in the United Sates,
France, the UK and Germany
Only 10% of the companies surveyed reported using
OSS for mission-critical applications (IDC, 2009)
Introduction
10. We maintain that
The apparently slow movement of organizations
toward mission-critical OSS
Has increased both the relevance and importance of
understanding the main barriers or constraints
preventing organizations from adopting these
software applications
(Drawing on Paré, Wybo and Delannoy, (2009))
Introduction
11. We conducted a Delphi survey to answer the
following research question : What are the
barriers that prevent organization from
adopting mission-critical open source
software applications ?
The study was carried out in two different
countries namely France and Canada
To lessen socio-economic context bias (Pudelko,
2006)
Introduction
12. France Canada
General Context
GDPcapita (US$) 42,377 50,345
International Telecommunication Union’s Digital Access Index (ITU-DAI) 0.72 0.78
ICT Development Index (IDI) 18 22
OSS Specific Context
Open source Index Ranks (out of 75 countries)
Activity Rank 1 28
Government Activity Rank 1 34
Industry Activity Rank 25 17
Community Education Activity Rank 3 16
Environment Rank 15 10
Government Environment Rank 18 11
Industry Environment Rank 18 15
Research Context
Sources: UN (2012); ITU (2012); Open Source Index Ranks (2009); HDI (2011); Center for Strategic and International Studies (2010)
13. Method: Delphi Survey
Phase 1:
Brainstorming
(n=29)
• A brainstorming round was conducted to elicit as many
barriers as possible from the two panels of experts.
Panelists were asked to provide short descriptions of the
barriers in order to aid the researchers consolidate the
responses into a single list
Phase 2:
Narrowing down
(n=29)
• The initial list of barriers was validated by panelists
• Each expert selected 10 barriers he/she considers most
important
• Only barriers considered by at least 25% of the experts
were selected for the following phase
Phase 3:
Ranking
(round 1: n=26)
(round 2: n=23)
• Each panelist rank ordered the final list of barriers
• A mean rank was calculated for each item
• Degree of consensus was assessed using Kendall’s W
• Ideally, the process continued until an acceptable level
of agreement was reached
14. France
(n=18)
Canada
(n=11)
Gender Male 16 (89%) 10 (91%)
Female 2 (11%) 1 (9%)
Age (years) 30-39 2 (11%) -
40-49 6 (33%) 6 (55%)
50-59 3 (17%) 2 (18%)
> 59 1 (5%) 3(27%)
OSS expertise ERP 7 (39%) 6 (55%)
CRM 6 (33%) 8 (73%)
Database software 6 (33%) 5 (45%)
Communication 6 (33%) 10 (91%)
Operating systems 5 (28%) 7 (63%)
Software development 5 (28%) 5 (45%)
Business intelligence 3 (17%) 4 (36%)
Network management 2 (11%) 2 (18%)
Other 6 (33%) -
Average (median) Average (median)
Experience in the IT industry (year) 13 (16) 15 (15)
Experience with OSS (year) 8 (12.5) 9 (9)
Method: Panel Demographics
16. BARRIERS TO MISSION-CRITICAL OSS ADOTION FR QC
ENVIRONMENTAL
External political pressure
Lack of guidelines from public authorities
Disadvantageous tender/procurement processes vis-à-vis OSS Mission-critical
solution
Lack of reliable information about mission-critical OSS products
Lack of homologation by government bodies
ORGANIZATIONAL
Conservative nature of CIOs and CEOs attitudes and practices
Lack of internal IT resources and expertise
Internal political pressure
Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD) with regard to Mission-Critical OSS service
providers reliability
Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD) with regard to Mission-Critical OSS product
reliability
Misunderstanding of OSS products and business models
OSSSPECIFIC
Mission-critical open source software product stereotype and prejudice
Lack of responsible third-party engagement
OSS industry and business model stereotype and prejudice
Insufficient market visibility and lack of marketing actions
Complexity of open source ecosystem
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17. Conclusions
Our overall goal
to contribute to the effort of identifying barriers that prevent
organization for adopting mission-critical OSS
In total, 7 out of the 16 most important barriers that we
found were not reported in the literature
We complement the OSS literature by adding new insights
to the existing body of knowledge dominated by client
perspective alone
18. Conclusions
The present study provides managers, consultants and
policy makers with an exhaustive, yet validated set of
mission-critical OSS barriers
Identifying the barriers is the first, necessary step to overcoming
them
It demonstrates the influence of socio-economic context
and the maturity of the field on the relative importance of
these barriers
To conclude, we must recognize the main limitations of our
findings
Additional Delphi studies must be conducted with OSS experts from
other parts of the world to allow more generalizability of the findings
19. THANK YOU !THANK YOU !
Dr Placide Poba-Nzaou
Professor
School of Management (ESG)
Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)
poba-nzaou.placide@uqam.ca