Introduction

Germany not only has a long history of being a leading innovator in several areas, but has also been a fast follower in adopting innovations, including information technologies. German firms generally have embraced and implemented IT solutions only after they have proved successful in other countries, but once proven, there is widespread adoption across large and small firms, and new technologies are integrated with existing technologies to obtain maximum benefits. This is somewhat analogous of many firms' adoption strategy for new information and communications technologies. These firms are unwilling to be the guinea pigs for brand-new, often cutting-edge or bleeding-edge ICT which is often unproven, “buggy,” unstable, and not perfected in many ways. Instead, fast-follower firms wait until right after early adopters have started the diffusion and just before “critical mass” has been achieved.

Two important factors driving adoption of IT in Germany are the international orientation of the country's economy and the dynamism of its small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), the so-called Mittelstand. Large multinational firms use technologies such as EDI very heavily to coordinate regional and global operations and to compete in a high-wage environment. However, Germany stands out among other countries in that its SMEs use many of these technologies to an equal, and sometimes greater, extent than large firms. As suppliers to large multinationals and as international competitors in their own right, German SMEs have had to be innovative and flexible to survive.