Rex Arendsen
email: r.arendsen@minfin.nl

Marc J Ter

Hanneke Hermsen

Exploring the Future of Public-Private eGovernment Service Delivery

Keywords: eGovernment, Intermediary Service Providers, Scenario Building

Intermediary service providers are important users and actors of eGovernment. This paper explores future longer-term collaborative models and partnerships between the public sector and divers new intermediaries. Four distinguished and logical scenarios of public-private cooperation around 2015 have been developed. Each 'extrema' presents a plausible future and specific implications and effects regarding the future role and position of the intermediary (e-)service providers. Whereas the current state-of-the-art shows a wide variety of intermediate roles, each of the future scenarios tends to stress one specific role. Being prepared for these futures is a major competitive advantage. The scenarios present the framework for assessing the impact of societal trends and present a test bed for the design of future-proof eGovernment strategies.

Introduction

Intermediary service providers are important users and actors of eGovernment. Personal income tax filing for instance is being supported by social intermediaries like unions or elderly organizations. Especially small and medium sized businesses (SME's) decide to outsource administrative, secondary processes. Shipping agencies for example take care of customs declarations, book-keepers fill in and send business tax notices of assessment and salary service organizations calculate and pay social security contributions and report to the statistical department [START_REF] Arendsen | On the Origin of Intermediary E-Government Services[END_REF]. In many countries nowadays these intermediary service providers have become part of a broader eGovernment multi channel service delivery strategy [START_REF] Pieterson | Channel Choice[END_REF], [START_REF] Klievink | Coordinating e-government service delivery[END_REF].

The role of intermediaries in eGovernment service delivery and governance has been addressed as a key area of eGovernment-specific socio-economic research challenges. Thus addressing the need to better understand and consider the needs of these intermediaries as both users and actors of eGovernment [START_REF] Centeno | A Prospective View of e-Government in the European Union[END_REF]. Numerous contemporary policy discussions and technological developments will influence intermediary service providers' future position and role with respect to eGovernment services delivery.

Outcomes of the policy debate regarding the capacity of the state and the development of alternative mechanisms for exerting control over society might effect current trade offs within public-private arrangements. At the extreme for example it has been argued that 'governance without government' will become the dominant pattern of management for advanced industrial democracies [START_REF] Peters | Governance Without Government? Rethinking Public Administration[END_REF].

Implementation of structural legal and administrative reforms will effect the intermediary's business case. It has been argued that currently an 'intermediary paradox' is preventing individual businesses to profit directly from the reduction of administrative burdens [START_REF] Arendsen | Geen Bericht[END_REF].

The Internet and different ICT's enable direct contact between organizations and their clients and lower transactions cost. Growing competition and innovation within the administrative services industry itself may result in the removal of the intermediary role in the services delivery channel [START_REF] Janssen | The Role Of Intermediaries In The Multi-Channel Services Delivery Strategies[END_REF].

Caused by low adoption rates of eGovernment services a growing number of countries chose mandatory implementation strategies for e-taxation and e-invoicing services [START_REF] Agostini | B2G Electronic Invoicing as Enforced High Impact Service: Open Issues[END_REF]. Analysis of the Dutch legal obligation of e-taxation for businesses indicates as a result a strengthening of the intermediary's position [START_REF] Arendsen | On the Origin of Intermediary E-Government Services[END_REF].

What might be the result of these discussions and technological developments over time, and towards what kind of public-private partnerships might this evolve? This paper explores these possible longer-term collaborative models and partnerships between the public sector and divers new intermediaries, which could help governments and private parties to respond to changing technologies and opportunities [START_REF]OECD: The e-Government imperative main findings[END_REF]. Scenario building has been used as a methodology to address future issues and to incorporate both private and public stakeholders in the research process.

The article proceeds as follows. First, the current state-of-the-art is analysed in the next paragraph. Then, the scenario building research methodology and its application to the specific case is illustrated briefly. The resulting four future scenarios are then introduced. Each scenario presents a possible future of the position of intermediary organizations with respect to the delivery of eGovernment services to businesses in the Netherlands. The time horizon was set at about the year 2015. Finally, this paper sketches the most manifest policy implications for the development of public-private cooperation.

State-of-the-art

On the one hand private sector intermediaries have been introduced by governments within delivery processes of public services. These government commissioned intermediaries [START_REF]Office of the e-Envoy: Policy Framework for a mixed economy in the supply of egovernment services[END_REF] deliver services on behalf of governmental organizations. Post offices for example may facilitate the issuing of drivers licences whereas notaries transfer cadastral data. ICT has enabled the outsourcing of a number of functions traditionally performed by the public bureaucracy to private sector companies.

On the other hand citizens and businesses decide to outsource activities to commercial intermediary service providers. These customer commissioned intermediaries [START_REF]Office of the e-Envoy: Policy Framework for a mixed economy in the supply of egovernment services[END_REF] provide a broad range of administrative and advisory services, which in most cases includes the inherent data reporting relationship with governmental organizations. This study has been focussed on the role of customer commissioned intermediaries providing eGovernment services to businesses.

Intermediaries provide many functions and roles that cannot be easily replaced, substituted or internalized through direct interactions. Four roles of intermediaries can be defined [START_REF] Arendsen | On the Origin of Intermediary E-Government Services[END_REF], [START_REF] Bailley | An Exploratory Study of the Emerging Role of Electronic Intermediaries[END_REF], [START_REF] Janssen | Evaluating the role of intermediaries in the electronic value chain[END_REF], [START_REF] Janssen | Do We Need Intermediaries in E-Government?[END_REF]:

-matching demand and supply: bridging the gap between the service requestor's wishes and requirements and the service provider's offers; -information processing: acquiring, aggregating and distributing data; -providing trust: ensuring the accountability of decisions; -providing interoperability: managing an institutional infrastructure used by multiple organizations.

Within the administrative data processing context of eGovernment these roles often overlap. For those who are not online for example, an intermediary can conduct eGovernment on their behalf. Thus bridging the gap between the demand and supply on the one hand and providing interoperability on the other hand [START_REF]Office of the e-Envoy: Policy Framework for a mixed economy in the supply of egovernment services[END_REF].

Matching demand and supply. Individual businesses have the choice either to implement direct electronic relationships with governmental organizations or to outsource these interactions to intermediary service providers. The UK Office of the e-Envoy [START_REF]Office of the e-Envoy: Policy Framework for a mixed economy in the supply of egovernment services[END_REF] states that due to their existing relationships with customers and insight into their needs, intermediaries are well placed to deliver effective eGovernment services in a customer-centric way. Agulnik [START_REF] Agulnik | Claiming state benefits online: the role of intermediaries[END_REF] illustrates that intermediaries are more likely to get people to claim online, because they provide more customerfocused services and are better placed to reach the digitally excluded. "The US Government believes a partnership with private industry will provide taxpayers with higher quality services by using the existing expertise of the private sector; maximize consumer choice; promote competition within the marketplace; and meet objectives in the least costly manner to taxpayers". Researcher hypothesise that the introduction of ICT will influence the market of intermediary e-services causing a disintermediation process as result of which traditional intermediary organizations will sooner or later disappear [START_REF] Malone | Electronic Markets and Electronic Hierarchies[END_REF], [START_REF] Chircu | Strategies for Internet Middlemen in the IDR Cycle[END_REF]. These disintermediation arguments are mainly based on reducing the cost of services transactions [START_REF] Gellman | Disintermediation and the internet[END_REF], [START_REF] Janssen | The Role Of Intermediaries In The Multi-Channel Services Delivery Strategies[END_REF]. On the other hand researchers expect new intermediaries to enter these markets, taking advantage of new market characteristics and delivering new added value services, resulting in (re-)intermediation [START_REF] Clemons | The Impact of Information Technology on the Organization of Economic Activity[END_REF], [START_REF] Klievink | Improving Government service delivery with private sector intermediaries[END_REF]. Information processing. The majority of the administrative business-to-government services originate from legal information obligations. Businesses are enforced to report data regarding their personnel, turnover, production processes, etcetera. These reporting costs are an administrative burden to many businesses. Allers [START_REF] Allers | Administrative and Compliance Costs of Taxation and Public Transfers in the Netherlands[END_REF], defines this administrative burden as "compliance cost: private sector costs of complying with regulations". Many European countries, amongst which the Netherlands, position eGovernment as a way to reduce this administrative burden of businesses [21].

Caused by the complexity, scale and diversity of these information obligations many SME's chose however to outsource this data reporting to governmental organizations. Contrary to most individual SME's, many of these intermediary service providers are able to gain efficiency benefits from electronic data reporting relationships with governmental organizations. A professional (ICT-) organization enables them to profit from economies of scale and to benefit from the so called electronic integration effect [START_REF] Malone | Electronic Markets and Electronic Hierarchies[END_REF]. Providing trust. Sarkar et al. [START_REF] Sarkar | Intermediaries and Cybermediaries[END_REF] point to the fact that trust may enforce the intermediary's position; users are likely to perceive intermediaries to be on their side. Intermediaries can enhance trust by reducing the risk of failures within the transaction process chain and are able to assure that transactions between commercial partners have been completed [START_REF] Bailley | An Exploratory Study of the Emerging Role of Electronic Intermediaries[END_REF]. An intermediary as a 'trusted third party', may provide legal cont(r)acts between parties, providing the authentication and integrity of the communication needed within inter-organizational relationships. The notary is an example of such a legally institutionalised trusted third party. Providing interoperability. Interoperability is defined as "the ability of ICT systems and supported business processes to exchange data and by that to share information and knowledge" [START_REF]IDABC: European Interoperability Framework for pan-European eGovernment Services[END_REF]. Communication services providers primarily focus on the logistics part of electronic message interchange, as for instance the routing, archiving and tracking and tracing of data [START_REF] Arendsen | Geen Bericht[END_REF]. These hubs provide network services like availability, security and capacity. Those intermediaries can play a major role in the adoption and diffusion process by helping to standardise the technologies that are used to deliver e-services [START_REF] Howells | Intermediation and the role of intermediaries in innovation[END_REF]. Next to that, not everyone will have access to electronic public services, particularly in rural areas [START_REF] Centeno | A Prospective View of e-Government in the European Union[END_REF] and developing countries; intermediaries can "bridge the gap between e-government implementation and social reality … and play an important role in the diffusion of e-services in relation to improving the availability, accessibility and enhancing privacy and security in a developing country" [START_REF] Al-Sobhi | The Role of Intermediaries In Facilitating E-Government Diffusion in Saudi Arabia[END_REF]. The business services providers' added value lies in the decoupling of business processes and message handling of organizations involved. This group of service providers consists amongst others of traditional book-keepers and advisors to which administrative task are being outsourced. New types of business service providers arise, like the application service providers (ASP's) which in general provide business functions via the Internet.

In what way might future developments influence trade-off's between these four functions and roles? Will one role prevail over the others? Unexpected cooperation between different types of intermediary service providers, hard-and software suppliers for instance will influence the future market of governmental e-services delivery [START_REF] Arendsen | Geen Bericht[END_REF]. The next paragraphs explore what the future may look like.

Research Method

In this study we applied the method of explorative scenario thinking. This structured approach does not try to eliminate uncertainty or tries to predict what is merely unpredictable, but on the contrary underlines uncertainties and ambiguity of the future. This relates to the fact that strategic decision making takes place within a context of uncertainty about the future. Scenario building is a widely used future research method and a not uncommon method in eGovernment research [START_REF] Duin | The futures of EU-based eGovernment: a scenario-based exploration[END_REF]. In general there are different approaches of constructing and using scenarios. Some scenarios are an extrapolation of current trends (extrapolative approach), usually resulting in three scenarios: a positive, middle and negative option. Other types of scenarios present a desirable future (normative scenarios) or are the result of desk research or trend watching.

The scenario building method used in our research strongly differs from forecasting. While forecasting predicts the near future based on the extrapolation of past and current developments, scenario building cuts off the past and requires us to look solely into the future. It helps to gain more insight into possible future developments. The scenarios are neutral: they are neither good nor bad futures [START_REF] Bicking | Looking into the future: scenario's for egovernment in 2020[END_REF].

.

Scenario development process

The explorative scenarios have been developed according to the following process: 1. Identifying (un)certainties. The process starts with the identification of the most important trends and developments (driving forces) within the social, economic, institutional and organizational domain. Next, these driving forces are ordered according to their impact on the organization under consideration (i.c. the intermediary services channel) as well as according to their relative uncertainty.

Identifying scenario axes:

Based on a 'trial and error process' the two most important uncertainties are determined. That is, the two most uncertain driving forces which are assessed to have the highest impact on the organization. These driving forces need to be independent of each other and when crossed, result in four clearly distinguished scenarios. The result of these first two steps are presented in paragraph 4.

3.

Developing the story lines. The third process step starts with the description of the end positions of the four scenarios. This means that four distinguished, plausible and logical coherent stories of the relevant environment in 2015 are created. Next, these stories are linked to the present by hypothetical events that need to take place in order for the end states to be developed. In this way each scenario has a beginning (the present), a middle and an end. 4. Wind-tunneling the scenarios. During this process step the scenarios are being used as a test bed of the future. In this case implications and effects of each scenario on the future role and position of the intermediary service providers have been analyzed. The result of the third and fourth process steps are presented in paragraph 5.

Strategy development.

During the last step different strategic options are generated for each scenario answering the question: "What would we want to do if this was how the real world would be developing?". In the final phase the options are then analyzed across all scenarios in order to improve them towards a robust strategy applicable in all four scenarios. Results of this final step are discussed in paragraphs 6 and 7.

Workshops and participants

Creativity and conflicting subjective opinions by (possibly biased) humans are important ingredients of scenario building methods. The scenarios in this study have been developed during four separate workshop sessions. The actual scenario building has been executed by business and governmental professionals and scientists familiar with public-private eGovernment service delivery. During the research project 25 experts participated, residing from: several accountancy organizations, commercial communication service providers within the agricultural and the logistics domain, ecommerce and ICT standardisation organizations, the Tax and Customs Administration, the Social Security Agency, the Ministry's of Finance and Economical Affairs and Dutch universities.

The individual workshop sessions were organised by a small project group and were facilitated by scenario building experts who assured the methodological quality of the process. The project group prepared and finalized the workshop documents. As a starting point of the brainstorms during the first workshops a long list of trends and driving forces has been produced based on desk research. The raw workshop results were captured and summarized into formal workshop documents.

During each workshop one or two process steps have been executed. Groups of five to six participants, moderated by a coach, produced results that were validated and/or enriched by other expert groups thus ensuring and stimulating a creative and goal oriented process. This iterative engineering process and the contribution of independent, multi-disciplinary experts support the validity of the workshop results. Next to that, as part of the final plenary strategic session, a new group of experts assessed the content validity and logical consistency of the scenario's.

Results: Key Uncertainties and Scenario-axes

The first two steps of the scenario development process resulted in the two most uncertain driving forces which are assessed to have the highest impact on the organization under consideration (i.c. the intermediary services channel). These two most uncertain driving forces result in contradictory and alternative futures and thus feed into four clearly distinguished scenarios. This opposite to 'certain' societal developments relevant in every scenario, like the altering demographic characteristics of the Netherlands and the ongoing digitalisation. With respect to this research objective, the exploration of possible longer-term collaborative models and partnerships between the public sector and divers new intermediaries, the two key uncertainties are:

-Trust in government (high or low). The extent to which society (citizens and businesses) have confidence in politics, municipalities, provinces, benefit agencies, etc. In case of high trust, people perceive government acts honestly, driven by high moral standards. In case of low trust people doubt governments intentions. -The organization of society (limited versus unlimited). This aspect addresses the way private persons, businesses and/or organizations/communities live and work together. In the 'limited society' uniformity and cost efficiency prevails. The 'one size fits all' mentality is based on rational economic motives which set boundaries to the freedom of choice. On the contrary, in the 'infinite, unlimited society', rational-economic drivers are less dominant. Personal motives and the desires to distinguish oneself fuel social processes.

These two key uncertainties define the four scenarios of public-private collaborative models. Trust in government on the vertical axis and Organization of society on the horizontal axis result into the four quadrants presented in figure 1.

Figure 1. The Uncertainties and Scenarios

We chose to name the scenarios after linguistic phenomena; stressing the importance of the aspect of communication and cooperation in each of the scenarios. These titles should help to grasp the meaning of each of the scenarios and to distinguish it from the others. Esperanto, one language bridging differences, opposite to Babylon, referring to 'a perfect Babel' where no one understands the other. Devote referring to be set apart and strongly affected to dedicate by a solemn act; (in the Netherlands also referring to a software company specialized in custom made software), opposite to Java, a public license, cross platform, software language.

Results: the Four Scenarios

This paragraph presents in sum the four distinguished, plausible and logical scenarios of public-private cooperation around 2015. The scenarios are presented as 'extrema' in order to contrast with each other. Each description starts with a short coherent storyline of the relevant environment, characterized in terms of political, social, and/or economical themes. Next, implications and effects of each scenario regarding the future role and position of the intermediary (e-)service providers are being highlighted.

C Babylon

Low trust in government

Scenario Esperanto

The scenario Esperanto presents a safe and high trust society. Security is a political top priority surpassing privacy. Persons and organizations focus on cooperation within changing collaborative models. Both citizens and businesses are compliant and prefer high trust relationships with government. They are however very demanding regarding the quality, flexibility and speed of governmental e-service delivery. People prefer to work for themselves or within private companies in stead of being a civil servant. Confronted with many employees retiring, most governmental organizations face human resource shortages. Sustainable innovation is a top priority of many non governmental organizations. Cooperation between European member states is close. This and the continuing globalisation empowers the Dutch open economy. Pushed by a growing spread of Internet applications services, ICT has become an integrated part of daily life. Esperanto pictures a world connected by open standards facilitating common understanding.

Implications and effects. Intermediaries intensify their relationships with governmental organizations. On the one hand forced by growing direct high trust relationships between individual businesses and government, on the other hand stimulated by growing governmental personnel shortages. These intermediaries become co-producers of electronic governmental services realizing substantial cost savings in the complete life cycle of governmental e-services. Using their former information and network position intermediaries are able to deliver custom-made, highly personalized services. To be able to cope with the growing number of (often project based) cooperative models, intermediaries try to specialize. They organize into groups of similar business partners in search for market influence or dominance.

Scenario Devote

The scenario Devote presents a society focused on self interest. Citizens more often feel unsafe and ask for more police and strict law enforcement. Citizens perceive high trust in government and its civil servants. By consequence, governmental organizations are in the position to formulate and execute policies regarding a broad range of societal issues. On the contrary, people have lost their faith in commercial organizations. The financial and economical crisis has undermined their legitimacy. Empowered by the application of new sustainable technologies governmental institutions have become well organised, efficient organizations. They do not experience any problems in finding new and qualified personnel. These organizations are now the driving force behind large innovative, former commercial, projects like for instance the establishment of wind energy parks in the North Sea. Stimulated by the European Commission specific national digitalisation programs are being implemented, focussing on efficient and uniform local e-service delivery.

Implications and effects. Within this scenario the intermediary's network position worsens very rapidly. A lack of trust undermines their independent commercial market position towards individual customers. On the other hand governmental organizations are able and capable to standardize e-service delivery. Thus resulting in as 'one size fits all'-quality of service accepted by citizens and businesses. On the operational level intermediary organizations will provide 'neutral' data processing capacity, labeled as extensions of government. Groups of intermediaries negotiate strategic alliances together with groups of governmental organizations. This high level cooperation aims at knowledge transfer and agenda setting in order to regain trust and define and develop new business.

Scenario Babylon

The scenario Babylon presents a society of communities. Citizens are pretty much self-reliant, have a low confidence in government and offer resistance to governmental interventions. Citizens prevail 'small scale' and 'home town', primarily focusing on national regions rather than on global or European cooperation. Protectionist trade barriers slow down innovation and globalization. As a result the open Dutch economy is in recession. Group identity empowers its members. Elderly people for instance organize into communities, protecting their own interests and creating their own services organization. Consensus is no longer the obvious political strategy, but each group strives for the realization of specific interests. Society is less interested and less in need of generic governmental service delivery. Governmental influence diminishes towards law enforcement issues and free market regulation. Government regulates the bargaining space between the different societal 'blocks' (groups of citizens and businesses) and defends transcending national interests.

Implications and effects. Within this scattered society intermediary service providers will become the glue between different societal groups. These groups are niche markets to commercial service providers. Some intermediary organizations have become the group's sole representative and data gateway in connection to other groups. Providing interoperability is their core competence. Towards government, these intermediaries represent the group and provide specific eGovernment services towards individual group members, citizens and businesses. A small number of strategic alliances dominates the market of intermediary e-services and defines and regulates the 'glue infrastructure'. This group of alliances is the negotiating party towards government and other industry groups.

Scenario Java

The scenario Java describes a scattered society in which citizens and businesses have a low level of trust in government. Citizens have to be self-reliant and focus on personal interests. Personal motives and the desires to distinguish oneself fuel social processes. As a result of increased international mobility, foreign employees have now become a familiar phenomenon in Dutch society. Numerous ICT applications enable businesses and citizens to interact and organize in different ways. e-Communities are the new pillars of society. Service delivery and production are increasingly organized in a project based manner. Within these projects and communities people and organizations temporarily unite private interest to realize common objectives. Government concentrates on a few basic policy domains like security and defense. If possible other governmental tasks are being outsourced to private companies.

Implications and effects. Within this scattered society trust provision is scarce but vital. Neither government nor societal groups are trustworthy or stable enough. Independent intermediary organizations will become the dominant societal trust providers. Their service delivery may even be extended towards other domains of common interest like insurance, finance, and social security. In that way intermediary service providers will become the dominant communication and service channel towards individual citizens and businesses. However, the perceived quality of intermediate service delivery heavily depends on the providers ability to customize and personalize transactions. Volatile e-communities ask for an agile organization of service delivery, and demanding individuals can only be satisfied by means of customer intimacy.

Conclusions

This paper's objective is to present possible future, innovative and longer-term, collaborative models and partnerships between the public sector and divers new intermediaries, which could help governments and private parties to respond to changing technologies and opportunities. Each of the four scenarios presents a different modus of public-private cooperation; some of which are potentially threatening to commercial service providers, others tempting and full of commercial opportunities. Some scenarios present omni present and well appreciated eGovernment services, in others eGovernment in hidden behind commercial intermediaries. The most provoking conclusion is perhaps the fact that each scenario presents a plausible, possible future. Independent of our personal or organizational interests and plans, future society might develop in one of these (neither 'good', nor 'bad') directions. One of the most interesting findings concerns the intermediary's future role and function. Whereas the current state-of-the-art shows a wide variety of intermediate role's, each of the future scenarios tends to stress one specific role. The same holds for the dominant type of e-service delivery; varying from servicing private ecommunities to the co-production of eGovernment services.

Being prepared for these futures is a major competitive advantage. These scenarios present the framework for assessing the impact of societal trends and present a test bed for the design of future-proof eGovernment strategies.

An important critical success factor has been the role of the independent facilitators who assured the result's objectivity and plausibility. Whereas each participant in the research project had its own perception of a desired future, based on personal feelings and organizational interests, the method of scenario building inspired the group to look frankly into the future.

Discussion

"What would we want to do if this was how the real world would be developing?" This question is the starting point from which organizations can begin with the assessment of their current eGovernment strategy. Each scenario presents a different view on the role of open standards, multi channel strategies, the quality of service and strategic partnerships.

Regardless of which scenario will deploy at the end, two organizational aspects are crucial in each transition process: agility and the ability to establish strategic alliances. These two organizational characteristic are critical success factors for the future 'survival of the fittest'. Each scenario presents a change in activities, responsibilities and inter-organizational relationships.

The process of change starts with the awareness that each organization is part of the changing network towards one of the possible scenarios presented in this paper.

Table 1 .

 1 Table 1 summarized the four scenarios developed in this study, from an intermediary's viewpoint. Scenarios for Future Public-Private Collaboration

	Scenario:	Esperanto	Devote	Babylon	Java
	Trust in	High	High	Low	Low
	government
	Openness society	No frontiers	Limited	Limited	No frontiers
	Intermediary	Co-producer of	Strategic, high	Distant business	Communication
	relation to	eGovernment	level partnerships	representative	channel towards
	government	services	on sector level		businesses
	Relation to	Distant	Distant	eGovernment	High trust provider
	customers			services provider
	Added value	Cost saving for	Low, primarily	Specific niche	Risk management
		government	data processing	services	and trust provision
	Intermediary	Specialization	Strategic	Strategic alliances	Customer intimacy
	business model		alliances		and services
	Dominant role	Demand-supply	Neutral	Interoperability	Trust provider,
	and function.		information	between power	operational
			processing	centers	interoperability


Rex Arendsen
email: r.arendsen@minfin.nl

Lidwien Van De Wijngaert
email: l.vandewijngaert@gw.utwente.nl

Government as a Launching Customer for eInvoicing

Keywords: Electronic Invoicing, eGovernment, Adoption of Innovations

de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

Introduction

The invoice is an important business document. It represents billing and payment information related to commercial transactions. Besides its role between trading partners, the invoice is essential to tax administration. VAT-related inspection and collection processes rely upon the integrity and authenticity of the invoice. Electronic invoicing is the electronic transfer of this billing and payment information via the Internet or other electronic means between trading partners. Unlike paper-based invoices, e-invoices provide all data in digital format. Such eInvoicing offers substantial benefits over paper invoicing. It allows for shorter payment delays, fewer errors, reduced printing and postage costs and, most importantly, fully integrated processing [START_REF]Reaping the Benefits of Electronic Invoicing for Europe[END_REF]. In Europe it is estimated that there were 15 billion business-tobusiness invoices in 2007 [START_REF][END_REF]. Removing VAT barriers to electronic invoicing for example is expected to lower the administrative burden on enterprises in Europe by up to a maximum of EUR 18 billion in the medium term [START_REF]European Commission: Third strategic review of Better Regulation in the European Union[END_REF]. The European Commission estimates that replacing regular paper invoices by e-invoices across the EU could result in approximately EUR 240 billion in savings over a six-year period [START_REF][END_REF], [START_REF]SEPA potential benefits at stake[END_REF]. Despite these compelling arguments, overall adoption rates of eInvoicing disappoint. Average market penetration of eInvoicing in 2009 in Europe was estimated at around 5% of all invoices annually exchanged in business-to-business relations [START_REF]Reaping the Benefits of Electronic Invoicing for Europe[END_REF], [START_REF] Billentis | EInvoicing -E-billing in Europe[END_REF]. Thus, hampering businesses individually and society in general to reap the benefits of this e-business innovation. Likewise, individual governmental organisations, being large buyers, can also save on paper handling and billing process costs. These potential governmental cost savings were the main driver for the Danish and Finnish government to mandate the private sector to send all invoices to the public sector via electronic means [START_REF]European Commission: Analysis of Business Requirements for eInvoicing in a Public Procurement Context. Final Study[END_REF].

Next to internal cost savings, "stimulating an environment that creates maximum reach between trading partners exchanging invoices" [START_REF]European Commission: The European eGovernment Action Plan 2011-2015[END_REF] is another driver behind governmental interventions within the e-business market place. The European Commission underlines the importance of governments promoting ICT adoption to the further development of e-business [8]. Next to the general awareness arising the Commission points to the role model of the public sector, e.g. by using public eprocurement. The Italian government for example has proposed to make the adoption of eInvoicing mandatory for central government administrations by mid 2008. Amongst others their explicit goal was to support the adoption of eInvoicing by Italian companies.

In this paper we elaborate on this second 'market stimulation driver' and focus on the specific role of eGovernment as a launching customer. In that case government deliberately chooses to be one of the innovators or early adopters of an electronic means of invoicing [START_REF]Reaping the Benefits of Electronic Invoicing for Europe[END_REF], [START_REF] Rogers | Diffusion of Innovations[END_REF]. Thus hoping and aiming to eliminate market failures by: enhancing network externalities, creating critical mass, setting a de facto standard and/or lowering price per unit. The question answered in this paper is: can eGovernment make a difference as a launching customer of electronic invoicing? We answer the question by analyzing and comparing the adoption intention of two groups of businesses in the Netherlands, one group solely conduction commercial businessto-business (B-to-B) transactions and another group also conducting commercial transactions with governmental customers (B-to-BG).

This paper proceeds with a brief theoretical analysis of strategies for accelerating the diffusion of eInvoicing. After that we will present an overview of adoption factors by making use of a situational approach towards the diffusion of innovations. The next paragraph then describes our research method. Results and statistical analysis are presented in the following paragraph. The paper finalizes with conclusions and a discussion of our findings.

Theoretical Background

The introduction of eInvoicing is an innovation to most companies, especially to small and medium scale enterprises (SME's) [START_REF]Enterprises sending and/or receiving e-invoices[END_REF], resulting in "new ways of doing business" [START_REF]Reaping the Benefits of Electronic Invoicing for Europe[END_REF]. In this study, the specific eGovernment context adds extra dimensions to this adoption issue [START_REF] Arendsen | Adoption of High Impact Governmental eServices, Seduce or Enforce?[END_REF]; thus influencing governmental adoption strategies and adoption factors.

eGovernment: Seduce or Enforce?

Large buyers in many cases posses the power to enforce suppliers to send invoices according to their specific (electronic) standards [START_REF] Morrell | Revisiting adoption factors of inter-organisational information systems in SMEs[END_REF]. Thus resulting in, often EDIbased, domain specific hub-and-spoke architectures [START_REF] Angeles | Revisiting the role of Internet-EDI in the current electronic commerce scene[END_REF], [START_REF] Legner | Electronic Bill Presentment and Payment[END_REF]. Governments can apply an additional enforcement instrument to exercise external pressure: legislation. Countries like Denmark, Sweden, Spain, Italy, Finland and Brazil have chosen (or announced) to legally oblige eInvoicing to governmental organisations [START_REF]European Commission: Analysis of Business Requirements for eInvoicing in a Public Procurement Context. Final Study[END_REF]. Agostini and Naggi [START_REF] Agostini | B2G Electronic Invoicing as Enforced High Impact Service[END_REF] question the effectiveness and legitimacy of this forced adoption of procedures and standards, "which have not achieved an established consensus under 'normal' circumstances". The risk is to improve internal efficiency for public bodies, while negatively affecting enterprises, which are in fact obliged to duplicate their invoicing and invoicing-connected procedures [START_REF] Agostini | B2G Electronic Invoicing as Enforced High Impact Service[END_REF].

Arendsen et al. [START_REF] Arendsen | Adoption of High Impact Governmental eServices, Seduce or Enforce?[END_REF] have examined factors influencing the adoption of governmental high impact applications by small and medium scale businesses. They suggest that (especially smaller) businesses follow another adoption approach towards governments than towards fellow businesses. Expected benefits and external competitive pressure are important adoptions factors in the business-to-business context, stimulating businesses to follow an offensive strategy. Within the businessto-government context companies on the contrary seem to tend to a more defensive strategy. A lack of organisational readiness (and willingness) makes them reluctant to invest in a long term e-relationship with governmental organisations. Malone [START_REF] Malone | Electronic Markets and Electronic Hierarchies[END_REF] shows that the provider of this kind of a relation is more than others capable of realising significant benefits. From that perspective, many electronic data exchange relations between businesses and governmental organisations can be characterized as an electronic hierarchy. A case study of the mandatory tax filing by Dutch businesses [START_REF] Arendsen | eTaxation and the Reduction of the Administrative Burden[END_REF] showed this was one of the dominant arguments for businesses to outsource these governmental e-services to intermediary parties.

The 'government as a launching customer'-strategy's primary objective has to be the homogeneous gain of efficiency throughout the whole economic system, with consequent positive repercussions on enterprises themselves, by winning the SMEs' typical "excess in inertia" [START_REF] Agostini | B2G Electronic Invoicing as Enforced High Impact Service[END_REF]. Countries like the Netherland in that respect have chosen for a less coercive, but more 'public policy encouragement' [START_REF]Reaping the Benefits of Electronic Invoicing for Europe[END_REF] strategy focussing on enterprises institutional dynamics, needs and beliefs [START_REF] Agostini | B2G Electronic Invoicing as Enforced High Impact Service[END_REF]. The next paragraph presents an overview of factors influencing the adoption of eInvoicing.

eInvoicing Adoption Factors

e-Invoices can be generated and transferred automatically and directly from the issuer's or service provider's financial supply chain systems to those of the recipient. Most of the economic benefits therefore do not arise from savings in printing and postage costs but rather from the full process automation and integration from order to payment between trading parties [START_REF][END_REF]. Consequently, much of the eInvoicing literature has centred the analysis about eInvoicing mainly with a focus on the supply-chain management and inter-organisational systems (IOS) theories. The adoption of IOS innovations in general has been broadly studied [START_REF] Elgarah | Data Exchange in Interorganizational Relationships[END_REF], assessing adoption drivers like efficiency, effectiveness and competitive position [START_REF] Agostini | B2G Electronic Invoicing as Enforced High Impact Service[END_REF]. Azadegan and Teich [START_REF] Azadegan | Effective benchmarking of innovation adoptions[END_REF] present an overview of adoption models and factors and assess the applicability to the eInvoicing domain. The adoption of business-to-government systems however has hardly been studied yet [START_REF] Arendsen | Adoption of High Impact Governmental eServices, Seduce or Enforce?[END_REF].

eInvoicing adoption factors can be defined from different perspectives. Rogers [START_REF] Rogers | Diffusion of Innovations[END_REF] defines adoption as: a decision to make full use of an innovation at the best course of action available. He suggests that technology adoption is the result of the effect of five groups of variables: the perceived attributes of the innovation, the type of decision making, communications channels used, change agent's efforts and the nature of the social system. Especially the five perceived attributes of innovations, relative advantage, complexity, trialability, observability and compatibility have been used in many studies concerning the adoption of (inter-)organisational information systems, like for instance financial systems [START_REF] Teo | Innovation Diffusion Theory as a Predictor of Adoption Intention for Financial EDI[END_REF] and EDI systems [START_REF] Premkumar | Determinants of EDI Adoption in the Transportation Industry[END_REF]. Several researchers however question the applicability of the theory for studying organisational adoption of the adoption of complex inter-organisational systems based on electronic data exchange relations [START_REF] Azadegan | Effective benchmarking of innovation adoptions[END_REF], [START_REF] Henriksen | Performance, Pressure and Politics: Motivators for Adoption of Interorganizational Information Systems[END_REF].

Tornatzky and Fleischer [START_REF] Tornatzky | The Process of Technological Innovation[END_REF] have developed an alternative model to study the adoption of technological innovations by organisations. Their TOE-model contains three variables influencing the adoption decision making process: the technological, organisational and the environmental context. Kuan and Chau [START_REF] Kuan | A perception-based model for Edi adoption in small businesses using a technology-organisation-environment framework[END_REF] used the model as a basis for their study of the adoption of the business-to-government system for the filing of import and export declarations in Hong Kong. Zhu et al. [START_REF] Zhu | A Cross-Country Study of Electronic Business Adoption Using the T-O-E Framework[END_REF] used it as foundation for their Electronic Business Adoption Model. They conclude that firm size is a significant adoption factor. They also show competitive pressure has a significant positive relation with the decision to adopt. Hong and Zhu [START_REF] Hong | Migrating to internet-based e-commerce: Factors affecting ecommerce adoption and migration at the firm level[END_REF] use the TOE model to explain how the integration of inter-organisational systems affects ecommerce adoption in US and Canadian businesses.

Iacovou et al. [START_REF] Iacovou | Electronic Data Interchange and Small Organizations: Adoption and Impact of Technology[END_REF] have developed a model focussing on the adoption of interorganisational systems and more specifically electronic data interchange systems by small and medium scale businesses. The model consists of three factors expected to positively influence the organisations adoption decision: perceived benefits, organisational readiness and external pressure. Chwelos et al. [START_REF] Chwelos | Research Report: Empirical Test of an EDI Adoption Model[END_REF] refined and extended this EDI adoption model. Their empirical study showed that especially perceived benefits, financial resources and IT sophistication had a positive relation with the intention to adopt. Grandon and Pearson [START_REF] Grandon | Electronic commerce adoption: empirical study of small and medium US businesses[END_REF] expanded the model towards application and adoption of e-commerce by SME's. In general it seems that the foremost indicator of adoption is the business's readiness to adopt, i.e. the internal capability in implementing a new technology. Azadegan and Teich [START_REF] Azadegan | Effective benchmarking of innovation adoptions[END_REF] add network factors like network size and interconnectedness to their theoretical framework for eprocurement technologies.

Similarly to Chwelos et al. [START_REF] Chwelos | Research Report: Empirical Test of an EDI Adoption Model[END_REF] our research focuses on the intention to adopt. Figure 1 presents the research model that was used in this research. As can be derived from figure 1, we deliberately left out the 'classic' TAM/UTAUT variables of 'Perceived usefulness' and 'Perceived ease of use'. As [START_REF] Benbassat | Quo Vadis[END_REF] points out, these concepts are largely tautological when it comes to explaining intention to adopt. Instead, our model uses two types of determinants: organisational factors and network (situational) factors. The intention to adopt was measured through a single choice question in which the answering categories characterised different phases of the adoption process.

Respondents were asked to state which phase characterised their position best. The organisational factors were measured as follows:

-Organisational size was measured in terms of the number of employees on a seven point scale, varying between 'Single person company' and '250 or more employees'. In addition we measured invoicing volume by looking at the number of suppliers, customers, invoices received and invoices sent. The volume was measured on a four point scale (0-10; 10-50; 50-100; 100+). -IT-readiness, Innovativeness and Attitude were measured through sevenpoint Likert scale items. The translated and shortened version of these items can be found in table 2. -Knowledge was measured through a set of ten true or false questions about eInvoicing. The number of correct and incorrect answers were counted. In addition the number of times a respondents answered 'Don't know' was counted a measure of absence of knowledge.

Based on the theoretical framework in section 2, the situational variables that were taken into account were:

-Adoption by others: the number of network parties that have adopted eInvoicing -Social influence: the degree to which the direct environment of respondents is positive (or negative) about eInvoicing. -Cost of investment: the perceived technical and organisational costs that need to be made to implement eInvoicing within the organisation.

Besides a general intend to adopt, the intention to adopt given specific practical circumstances (situational factors) has been investigated. In order to measure this, we took a vignette approach [START_REF] Van De Wijngaert | Vignette approach[END_REF]. In this approach respondents are presented with hypothetical situations. A specific case is a unique combination of values and variables. The vignette approach deals with network complexities by combining the strengths of survey and experimental research. One of the vignettes used in the study, illustrates the practical use of the approach:

Suppose that you have been made responsible for the strategic choice whether to adopt eInvoicing in your company. From the research you have performed, you gather that eInvoicing is hardly being used in your sector. You estimate the technical and organisational costs for implementing eInvoicing within the organisation are reasonable. You have seen some examples of companies using eInvoicing successfully. Moreover, your industry organisation is positive about eInvoicing.

After this vignette, respondents were asked how likely it is that their company switches to eInvoicing within 12 months, given the described situation. For this we used a seven-point Likert scale. By systematically varying the vignettes, the effect of differences between situations could be investigated. In addition, respondents were presented with two cases. In order to prevent order effects the cases were rotated differently for different respondents. Analysis of the data shows that there were no significant differences between the two rounds.

Data gathering and data analysis

In May 2010 data has been gathered via the online panel of a commercial organisation. In total 5150 people were invited to participate in the research. Of the 1221 respondents that started the online survey 512 respondents (42%) were filtered out because they did not meet the selection criteria. Another 78 respondents (6%) stopped during the survey. In the end 613 respondents filled out the questionnaire completely. This sample is representative with regard to industry sector. However, this study is biased in favour of larger size companies. A representative number of smaller sized companies would pose serious statistical challenges: it would cause a lack of statistical power to detect significant effects. Hence, proportional representation of companies by size is not a viable alternative for the present study. Data analysis concentrated on two questions: to what extent do the two groups (Bto-B and B-to-BG) differ with regard to organisational factors? (see paragraph 4.1) and to what degree do the adoption factors influence the intention to adopt eInvoicing for both groups? (see paragraph 4.2). In order to obtain an answer to the first question we used descriptive statistics and t-tests. The second question is answered by making use of structural equation modelling with WARP PLS [START_REF] Kock | Warp PLS 1.0 User Manual[END_REF].

Results

Analysing Organisational Adoption Factors

Intention to adopt eInvoicing. In the questionnaire we asked companies how soon they were thinking of switching to eInvoicing as a general measure of adoption intention. Figure 2 directly compares B-to-B and B-to-BG within each category of adopters. From the figure we conclude that B-to-BG are more inclined to switch to eInvoicing than B-to-B. Using independent t-test, this difference is significant (t=-6.082; p<.00). Organisation size. The larger an organisation, the more often it not only has other businesses but also governments as their customer. This is also reflected in the number of suppliers and customers and the number of invoices sent and received. All differences are significant as can be derived from table 1. Other organisational factors. Table 2 shows the scores for B-to-BG and B-to-B for the organizational factors Innovativeness, IT-readiness, Attitude and knowledge. First thing that stands out is that all items score higher than 4 on a five point scale. This result might indicate that all items load on one grand underlying construct. In order to check this we ran a factor analysis on the scale items. Results shows that, as was intended, the items represent the three different underlying constructs. A second thing that can be deducted from table 2 is that organisations that conduct business with governmental organisations (B-to-BG) systematically score higher on Innovativeness and IT-readiness than businesses from the B-to-B group. Results in Table 2 show that almost all differences between the two groups are significant.

Regarding the factor Attitude the differences are smaller but still the scores for B-to-BG are systematically higher than for B-to-B. The factors Knowledge shows a slightly different picture. Organisations that do business with the government answer more questions correctly but more incorrectly as well. Businesses solely conducting business with fellow businesses more often "do not know" the answer.

Explaining Adoption Intention

The results from the previous section show that B-to-B and B-to-BG differ when it comes to size, innovativeness, IT readiness, attitude and knowledge. The question that can now be asked is, do these factors predict adoption and do they predict adoption differently for B-to-B and B-to-BG. In order to answer that question we use the structured equation modelling (using WARP PLS) to predict adoption for both groups separately. The result of this analysis is presented in table 3.

Results show that for both groups of business the resulting research model has a good fit and explains over 30% of the variance. All relationships are significant in both models and the differences between the two groups are small. (The average inflation factor is low for both models. Moreover, the individual items load as intended on the latent variables.) Results presented in table 3 show that the general adoption intention and the intention to adopt within 12 months are, quite logically, strongly connected to each other. It is more interesting to see that the predictive power of the general (organizational and individual) factors explain equally well as the situational factors that explain the intention to adopt within twelve months. This means that situational factors form a strong component in eventual adoption. In addition we would like to stress that social influence is the most important predictor of the situational factors.

Conclusions

The question answered in this paper is: can eGovernment make a difference as a launching customer of electronic invoicing? As opposed to the mandatory strategies of some European governments, this study focussed on the voluntarily adoption behaviour of businesses and on factors influencing their intention to adopt eInvoicing.

Results show that companies that conduct business with the government are more inclined to switch to eInvoicing than companies that only do business with other companies. In addition we observe that these companies that carry out business with the government are in general larger, more innovative, more IT-ready and have a more positive attitude towards eInvoicing.

Further analysis shows that these are all relevant and explaining factors for the adoption of eInvoicing. Both organisational and situational factors contribute to the adoption of eInvoicing. Both groups of factors explain approximately one third of the total variance. A general intention to adopt is explained well by organisational factors whereas a more specific likeliness of adopting can very well be related to situational factors. We conclude that situational factors should be taken into account when predicting the diffusion of eInvoicing and new technologies in general Together these results provide a positive answer to the question whether or not eGovernment can make a difference as a launching customer of electronic invoicing. Companies conducting business with governmental organisations are more willing and able to start implementing eInvoicing. To governmental organisations, this group of suppliers is the obvious target group to launch this innovation. Stimulated by their (governmental) customers this group of businesses is more than others in the position to become the early adopters, to increase network externalities and to start the snowball rolling. By focussing on this group of businesses first, government can make a difference.

Discussion

Results show that companies that conduct business with the government are larger than companies that only do business with other companies. This indicates that governmental procurement strategies in general have a bias towards larger suppliers. This may be explained by the fact that governmental organisations have a tendency to reduce risks and prefer relationships with stable, proven and mature organisations. This however hampers competition and decreases small companies' possibilities to conclude long term contracts with larger customers.

In the case of eInvoicing this might put a brake on the rate of diffusion. As a launching customer government primarily reaches businesses having a larger than the average company size. This asks for additional policy measures to stimulate adoption amongst (very) small companies. Governmental organisations could for example stimulate their suppliers, as part of the overall launching customer strategy, to motivate their (smaller) suppliers to start eInvoicing with them. Results of this study show that situational factors like Social influence and Adoption by others are powerful adoption factors. This research does not only yield practical implications. From a scientific point of view, this research has a contribution as well. The combined approach of organisational and situational (network) factors proved to be fruitful. Using this approach we were able to omit the variables central to adoption models such as TAM [START_REF] Davis | Perceived Usefulness, Perceives Ease of Use and User Acceptance of Information Technology[END_REF] and UTAUT [START_REF] Venkatesh | User acceptance of information technology: Toward a unified view[END_REF] (i.e. perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use). By doing this we have build a model that may not yield the high levels of explained variance custom in TAM-like research. However, we did create a model that explains the diffusion of an innovation from the situation rather than a model that explains technology use from its own usefulness. Having said that, we do acknowledge that we have to improve the models by gaining more in depth insight into network factors. Future research will be aimed at this.

Figure 1 .

 1 Figure 1. Research Model

Figure 2 .

 2 Figure 2. Intention to Adopt: phases in the adoption process

Table 1 .

 1 Differences between B-to-B and B-to-BG for organisation size

		Mean
		B-to-B	B-to-BG	t	p
	Organisation size 1	2.57	3.83	-9.54	0.00
	Number of suppliers 2	1.96	2.54	-9.33	0.00
	Number of customers 2	2.55	2.97	-6.29	0.00
	Number of invoices received 2	1.74	2.25	-7.89	0.00
	Number of invoices sent 2	1.92	2.37	-6.32	0.00
	1 Measured on a seven point scale
	2 Measured on a four point scale (1 = 0-10; 2 = 10-50; 3 = 50-100; 4 = 100+)

Table 2 .

 2 Differences between B-to-B (n=373) and B-to-BG (n=196) for Innovativeness, ITreadiness, Attitude and Knowledge (all items have been recoded so that higher scores represent a positive direction)

	B-to-B B-to-BG	t	df Sign.

Table 3 .

 3 SEM analysis for B-to-B (n=373) and B-to-BG (n=196)

		B-to-B		B-to-BG
	Average Path Coefficient	0.22 **	0.22 **
	Average R Squared	0.31 **	0.33 **
	Average Inflation Factor	1.19 good if <5	1.18 good if <5
			Intention		Intention
	Adoption intention	Intention to adop	in 12 months Intention to adop	in 12 months
	R squared	0.30 0.33	0.27 0.40
	Organisation size	0.19 **	0.23 **
	Innovativeness	0.16 **	0.19 **
	IT-Readiness	0.22 **	0.09 *
	Knowledge
	(# correct answers)	0.20 **	0.13 **
	Attitude	0.19 **	0.22 **
	Adoption intention
	(in general)		0.45 **		0.48 **
	Critical mass		0.15 **		0.13 **
	Costs for implementation		0.12 **		0.16 **
	Social influence		0.32 **		0.37 **
	* p<0.05; ** p<0.001