Hosted, cloud and SaaS, off-premises ERP systems adoption by Moroccan SMEs: A focus group study

Abstract

Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SME) are economic catalysts whose needs should be at the heart of each country's policymaking priority. Either for Large Enterprises or SMEs, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems are one of the most discussed subjects on the Information System (IS) research field. Their successful implementation promises a 360-view of the business activity, a more consistent IS providing quality data that supports enterprises seek for increased productivity and competitiveness. However, very frustrating confusions can be found almost everywhere discussing traditional ERP, Web-based ERP, Internet-enabled ERP, Hosted ERP, SaaS ERP and Cloud ERP in both the academia and professional literature. In this study, while distinguishing between SMEs that use ICT as a support to their primary business process and SMEs whose core business is ICT, the authors try to help draw lines between the three off-premises ERP system deployment models adoption, namely the Hosted ERP, SaaS ERP and Cloud ERP system deployment models. A focus group of three Moroccan SMEs whose core business is ICT, meets to discuss the three off-premises ERP systems deployment models adoption by Moroccan SMEs that use ICT as a support to their primary business process. Nine Experts from the ICT oriented SMEs share their views on motives and barriers to the deployment models adoption for the case of Morocco. The findings are expected to assist SMEs in their off-premises ERP systems adoption. They may also inform other ERP vendors and integrators with respect to end user firms' concerns.