B2B Electronic Marketplaces in Supply Chain Management: Analyzing Recent Research Activities

Since their rise during the 1990s, business-to-business (B2B) electronic marketplaces have been subject to numerous scientific articles. Especially during the dot-com era, these research efforts have been accompanied by several start-ups such as CommerceOne, with mixed market success. For researchers looking for promising areas of IS research, these facts raise the question whether B2B electronic marketplaces still constitute a viable option which is worth focusing on. The work at hand strives to answer that question by conducting a literature analysis covering the period from 2005 to 2009. We examined 11 major IS-journals as well as three major IS conferences in search of articles dealing with or relating to B2B electronic marketplaces. The analysis of the data gathered throughout that process provides an overview of the B2B electronic marketplace research of the past five years from multiple perspectives. Our analysis indentifies several research opportunities for researchers, e.g., by indentifying research methods that have not been applied to examine certain topics, or by identifying geographical regions that have been under-researched regarding the application of B2B electronic marketplaces. Further, our work will help practitioners seeking reliable information regarding B2B electronic marketplaces to indentify publication outlets relevant for this field of research.