Cloud computing is a new technology paradigm. More and more firms have planned to adopt cloud services recently. Thus, the understanding of factors inhibiting or fostering the adoption of cloud computing becomes very important. Much of the literature on cloud adoption has focused on the benefits and concerns of cloud computing from the technology point of view, but there is a need to pay more attention to how firms’ own characteristics affect their decisions on cloud computing adoption. This study proposes that firms’ cloud decision-making will be influenced by their IT governance mechanism and prior IT outsourcing experience. Besides, since there are different cloud service models (IaaS/PaaS/SaaS), firms are interested in these different types of cloud for different reasons. This research also investigates whether different cloud benefits and concerns will influence different types of cloud adoption. We collected 190 Taiwanese firms to empirically examine our proposed model. The results show that, firms with centralized IT governance and IT outsourcing experience have a higher intention to adopt cloud services. We also found that IT governance and IT outsourcing experience not only have the direct effects but also interaction effects on firms’ cloud adoption. The proposed model could assist cloud vendors in choosing their target market, and help cloud users better understand the factors that affect their migration to cloud services.

Cloud computing is a new technology paradigm. More and more firms have planned to adopt cloud services recently. Thus, the understanding of factors inhibiting or fostering the adoption of cloud computing becomes very important. Much of the literature on cloud adoption has focused on the benefits and concerns of cloud computing from the technology point of view, but there is a need to pay more attention to how firms’ own characteristics affect their decisions on cloud computing adoption. This study proposes that firms’ cloud decision-making will be influenced by their IT governance mechanism and prior IT outsourcing experience. Besides, since there are different cloud service models (IaaS/PaaS/SaaS), firms are interested in these different types of cloud for different reasons. This research also investigates whether different cloud benefits and concerns will influence different types of cloud adoption. We collected 190 Taiwanese firms to empirically examine our proposed model. The results show that, firms with centralized IT governance and IT outsourcing experience have a higher intention to adopt cloud services. We also found that IT governance and IT outsourcing experience not only have the direct effects but also interaction effects on firms’ cloud adoption. The proposed model could assist cloud vendors in choosing their target market, and help cloud users better understand the factors that affect their migration to cloud services.

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