Adoption of E-Business and Business Performance of Hotel Sector in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Rapid growth and advancements in Information Technology during the last decade has revolutionized the way that businesses operate. Introduction of internet and World Wide Web have supported this fast growth. In present context, there is an intensive growth in electronic market place and it is evident that Information Technology is critical to enhance the competitiveness and firm value hence; many firms adopt e-business for better management of daily tasks. The potential of electronic business to transform business models, organisational structures and processes and relationships with customers, suppliers and other business partners is now universally recognized (Zhu 2004; Zhu, Kraemer & Xu 2006). In relation to tourism industry, especially the hotel sector uses E- business applications for their business activities. Previous research examined the utilisation of internet based technologies in hotel industry by Siguaw (2003) and Wei (2001), emerging trends in electronic hotel distribution ( Carrol & Siguaw 2003), hotel’s online pricing making hotel reservations practices (O’Cornnor 2003), differences in customer satisfaction and loyalty when making hotel reservations using an online versus offline medium (Shankar, Smith & Rangaswamy 2003) and hotels’ web site design, features and quality ( Baloglu & Pekcan 2006; Chug & Law 2003).