Assessing the impact of using the Internet for competitive intelligence

The Internet, as an information-rich resource and an interorganizational co mmunications tool, has transformed the way that firms gather, produce and t ransmit competitive intelligence (CI). Yet, there is little empirical work on the impact of the Internet on CI and the subsequent effects on the organ ization. This study fills that gap by studying downstream impact of Interne t usage on both CI and the organization. A questionnaire survey is used to gather data for the study. The findings indicate that research and external use of the Internet is significantly related to quality of CI information. However, the relationship between internal use and quality of CI informati on is not significant. The study also provides empirical evidence that qual ity of CI information is positively related to organizational impact. Impli cations of the results are discussed. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V All rig hts reserved.