Centralized Information Systems in the Lodging Industry: Implications for Knowledge Management

The open standards of the Internet have brought about a centralized shift in the way franchisors interact with franchisees. Using centralized systems such as those enabled by Application Service Providers, lodging franchisors can greatly leverage the benefits of centralization that goes beyond the domains of rich transactional processing. The purpose of this study was to examine the forces that will shape the development of centralized information architectures, while simultaneously shedding light on the new knowledge that lodging franchisors can harness and diffuse across the network. The study develops a lodging-based organizational creation framework. Implications for IT managers are discussed.