Interoperability adoption among government and corporate portals in India: a study

The purpose of this study is to examine the position of interoperability of government and corporate portals in technological adoption space in India in terms of three critical dimensions: data integration, process integration and communication integration.

This exploratory study was conducted through a survey questionnaire from 300 portals of government departments and public sector undertakings (PSUs) in India. Data were also collected from portals of Indian companies and the results have been compared with those of the government portals.

The results show that the majority of government portals in India have initiated integration. Second, the portals of Indian companies are performing better than the portals of government and PSUs for achieving an interoperable position. Third, there is high dispersion in level of integration of government portals in India.

The portals with the lowest level of integration in government in India will determine when government will actually attain full horizontal integration and hence achieve an interoperable portal as there is high dispersion in level of integration of government portals in India. Also, for achieving an interoperable government portal, an organization needs to focus on the weakest factors of each dimension.

This study is the first to examine the position of interoperability in technological adoption space in India. The results lead to a number of recommendations for achieving interoperability for government portals in India. The study also highlights the weakest factors of each dimension that require more improvement than other factors.