A Process Study of New Technology Adoption in Smaller Manufacturing Firms*

ABSTRACT Based on longitudinal case studies of new technology adoption in five smaller Canadian manufacturing firms, this article develops an inductive process model that views the technology adoption process as a partially nested set of three parallel and interacting sub‐processes that are different in nature: the strategic commitment process, the technology choice process and the financial justification process. These processes are themselves intertwined with other strategic decision processes in the firm, and influenced by a dynamic set of contextual elements that interact with one another over time. the study underlines the problems associated with a narrow conception of technology adoption as a ‘decision’while showing how various process models from the literature are useful in understanding different parts of the overall process of adoption