Abstract

Small businesses need simple solutions that are timely and efficient. As new technologies come into play, small businesses find new market opportunities and challenges. Apart from cost and resource considerations involved in Information Technology (IT) related operations, small businesses lack qualified IT staff and the resources to train employees on new technologies. In this digital age, these issues become critical especially because of the resulting digital divide, the gap between those with access to information, the ‘haves’, and those without access, the ‘have-nots’, that leaves certain segments (e.g., small businesses, minorities, low-income consumers) out of current trends (Companie 2001; Peterson and Dibrell 2002; U.S. Congress 2012). Studies suggest the gap among ethnic minorities is larger than that for the dominant culture (Hoffman et al. 1997; Zickuhr and Smith 2012). Thus it is important to understand not only small business adoption of such technologies, but the adoption and use of such technologies by minority-owned small businesses. This is indeed the focus of this chapter.