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1. Introduction
The contemporary global economy emphasizes the wise use of intellectual capital and technology to build competitive advantage via integrating processes, supporting corporate strategies, and optimizing resources (Metaxiotis, 2009; Pang and Jang, 2008). Enterprise resource planning (ERP) software represents one of such state-of-the-art information technologies that integrate managerial and operational processes within and beyond the traditional boundaries (Ahituv et al., 2002; Hitt et al., 2002; Shiau et al., 2009). Lall and Teyarachakul (2006) and Shiau et al. (2009) posit that ERP integrates and supports production, procurement, human resources, finance and accounting, marketing and distribution, and other functional and sub-functional systems. Scholars (Federici, 2009; Holsapple and Sena, 2005; Maguire et al., 2007) propose that process integration of this sort provides enterprises with opportunities to reduce costs and improve efficiencies through cycle time and lead-time compression, communications, optimal inventory holding, improved product quality, network relationship, and search activities. Although ERP makes operationally significant promises, van Everdingen et al. (2000) and Maguire et al. (2007) believe that significant number of vendors principally targets large firms when the agility of small enterprises and their aggressive quest to build competitiveness make them have even better need for the software. Empirical evidence (Waarts et al., 2002; Kumar and Hillegersberg, 2000; Kannabiran and Dharmalingam, 2012) confirms that large firms are more predisposed to adopt digital applications than small firms.
Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) rarely have the cognate experience and resources to effectively implement digital applications (Chuang et al., 2009; Shiau et al., 2009; Kannabiran and Dharmalingam, 2012) though studies (Ramdani et al., 2009; Lall and Teyarachakul, 2006; Alsene, 2007; Maguire et al., 2007) show that the need to improve market positioning and to benefit from governments’ support programs has lately precipitated SMEs’ adoption of ERP in some economies. However, adoption models have been proposed by scholars to track down the pace of diffusion of any innovation. Among such models are technology acceptance model (TAM) (Davis, 1989), theory of reasoned action (TRA) (Ajzen and Fishbein, 1980), theory of planned behavior (TPB) (Ajzen, 1991), innovation diffusion theory (Rogers, 2003), stage model (Poon and Swatman, 1999), technology-organization-environment (T-O-E) (Tornatzky and Fleischer, 1990), and resource-based view (Caldeira and Ward, 2003). Although some of these models/theories...