BIG DATA ADOPTION IN SELECTED COMPANIES OF THE RETAIL SECTOR IN THE REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA

In a highly digitalized world, big data and analytics are among major trends companies worldwide are facing. As companies generate data across different sources (information systems), which is increasing rapidly in volume, variety and velocity, big data analytics becomes essential. Big data is a term that describes the large volume of data (both structured and unstructured), that overwhelms a business on a day-to-day basis. But the importance of big data doesn’t revolve around how much data one organization has, but what organizations do with the data that matters. Big data and analytics, provide organizations with the opportunity to analyze data generated from any source and to find answers that enable cost reductions, time reductions, new product development and optimized offerings, and smart decision making.Big data is affecting companies from different size and in almost every industry, and has the potential not only to transform the business world, but the society as well at large extent. Emerging literature and the empirical evidence suggest that companies from the retail sector can gain competitive advantage from data if they adopt big data analytics technologies. In spite of that, companies in the country are still in the early stages of adoption of big data analytics technologies. Hence, the goal of this paper is to determine factors affecting the big data analytics adoption in selected companies in the Republic of Macedonia from the retail sector. This is a pilot study and as such represents the first attempt to assess the level of big data analytics adoption in the country. This small scale preliminary study will provide evaluation of the feasibility of the key steps of the proposed research model (methodology) in order to conduct future research in larger extent and sample.There have been several theoretical models that explain technology acceptance. The research model in this study is based on Technology-Organization-Environment (TOE) framework (Tornatzky & Fleischer, 1990). The TOE framework explains that adoption of technological innovations is influenced by a range of factors in the context of the technology, organization and external environment. The framework explains that these three factors stimulate and influence the technology innovation adoption-decision in companies. It is considered as multi-perspective framework and an integrative model that is developed for studying factors affecting adoption of innovative technologies and has been used to assess organizations’ adoption of big data analytics technologies mostly in telecommunications, e- commerce and other.The proposed research model specifies the following technological characteristics (technical capacity, relative advantage and complexity), intra-organizational factors (top management support, organizational culture, organizational size and IT expertise/ technological competence), and inter-organizational factors (competitive pressure, external support, and regulatory /government policy as well as data security and privacy) as determinants of big data analytics adoption. The preliminary results of this pilot study support the research model and the methodology. The significance of the proposed determinants/factors can help managers formulate their analytics strategies and increase the use of big data technology in order to fulfil organizational goals and achieve better organizational performance.