The DOI matches its Crossref record; 2 of the 2 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Does Information Technology Lead to Smaller Firms?
Abstract
Many changes in the organization of work in the United States since 1975 have been attributed to the increased capabilities and use of information technology (IT) in business. However, few studies have attempted to empirically examine these relationships. The primary goal of this paper is to assess the hypothesis that investments in information technology are at least partially responsible for the important organizational change, the shift of economic activity to smaller firms. We examine this hypothesis using industry-level data on IT capital and four measures of firm size, including employees and sales per firm. We find broad evidence that investment in IT is significantly associated with subsequent decreases in the average size of firms. We also find that these decreases in firm size are most pronounced two to three years after the IT investment is made.
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“Econometric analyses of the overall U.S. economy in the period 1975-1985 are also consistent with these predictions: the use of information technology appears to be correlated with decreases in both firm size and vertical integration [Brynjolfsson et al. 19941.”
From The interdisciplinary study of coordination (1994) · cites this paper as Brynjolfsson et al. 1994
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Citations
Cites
The productivity paradox of information technology
Brynjolfsson, E. (1993) · Communications of the ACM · doi:10.1145/163298.163309 · Cited by 2,604
Self-citationThe impact of information systems on organizations and markets
Gurbaxani, V., & Whang, S. (1991) · Communications of the ACM · doi:10.1145/99977.99990 · Cited by 960
Self-citation
Cited by
The interdisciplinary study of coordination
Malone, T. W., & Crowston, K. (1994) · ACM Computing Surveys · doi:10.1145/174666.174668 · Cited by 3,504
Self-citationBeyond computation: Information technology, organizational transformation and business performance
Brynjolfsson, E., & Hitt, L. M. (2000) · Journal of Economic Perspectives · doi:10.1257/jep.14.4.23 · Cited by 3,335
Self-citationThe productivity paradox of information technology
Brynjolfsson, E. (1993) · Communications of the ACM · doi:10.1145/163298.163309 · Cited by 2,604
Self-citationMarket, Hierarchy, and Trust: The Knowledge Economy and the Future of Capitalism
Adler, P. S. (2001) · Organization Science · doi:10.1287/orsc.12.2.215.10117 · Cited by 1,512
Zhu, K., Kraemer, K., & Xu, S. (2003) · European Journal of Information Systems · doi:10.1057/palgrave.ejis.3000475 · Cited by 1,043
Metadata
- Authors
- Brynjolfsson, E., Malone, T. W., Gurbaxani, V., & Kambil, A.
- Venue
- Management Science
- Published
- 1994-12
- Volume
- 40
- Issue
- 12
- Pages
- 1628-1644
- ISSN
- 0025-1909 (ISSN-L)
- 1526-5501
- OpenAlex
- W2164304787
- Cited by
- 682
- References
- 2
- FWCI
- 46.24
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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- CoChat. (2026). Citation check: Does Information Technology Lead to Smaller Firms? https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1287/mnsc.40.12.1628
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- Brynjolfsson, E., Malone, T. W., Gurbaxani, V., & Kambil, A. (1994). Does Information Technology Lead to Smaller Firms? Management Science. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.40.12.1628
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Bibliographic data: Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Crossref.
Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
