The benefits of IS for CIM applications: A survey

CIM integrates production, administrative, and support functions in a manufacturing firm by tying together separate automated systems. To identify benefits from automating information systems hereafter 'IS' applications, and to determine if and why different firms achieve different levels of benefit from their IS, structured interviews were held with managers of more than 300 manufacturing companies located in Israel. This study's results show that the number of IS applications implemented has a significant, positive relationship with the overall benefit derived by the organization from using its entire IS portfolio. The results further show that the benefit an organization derives from using an individual application depends not on the number of applications implemented, but rather on other organizational characteristics. Transaction-processing applications generally provide greater benefits than more decisionoriented applications, regardless of an organization's characteristics. Benefits from decision-s...