Small vs Large - Canadian Business Technology Gap Defined
The race to catch the dragon's tail is a tough one in the business world. Small businesses are adopting basic techologies at an increasing pace, however, large businesses continue to raise the technological bar...and by doing so, manage to maintain a technology advantage between themselves and small businesses.
Statistics Canada published a report last month titled, "Information and Communication Technology Use: Are Small Firms Catching Up?." (The complete report is available in PDF.)
The Statistics Canada report, written by Mark Uhrbach and Bryan van Tol, provides statistical information on where small business made gains in technology during the period 2000-2002. Significant to the report are the technologies used to define the different gaps. Use of PCs, email, and internet access are criteria where small business have made significant gains. The criteria where large businesses have increased the rate of acceptance include: website, online purchasing, online selling, and high speed access.
A full year of data, 2003, is not included in this report...and that is OK. In technology time, a year a significant period. In an expanded list of criteria for the technology Dragon, where should wireless access, the pda(s), internet delivery via the power grid, and multi-lingual web sites fit into business technology advantages? As the report shows, the use of PCs, email, an internet use is approaching a high level of diffusion. How much longer will it be before email rolls off the list and joins the ubiquitous telephone as a technology that we take for granted in business operations? It took the telephone nearly 100 years to reach diffusion within the industrialized world, my, how the technology timeline (flash) is compressed!...and the tale of the dragon moves on.