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Welcome

Welcome to the official page of the Special Interest Group on Advances in Sourcing (SIG Sourcing) of the Association of Information Systems. This site provides networking opportunity to the members of the special interest group, a way of keeping in touch between meetings, and information to keep you current with the latest developments.

SIG Sourcing was formed in 2018 in response to the growing interest in the IS research community on various aspects associated with sourcing of IT, software development, business processes, software services, ideas and/or data in digital global economy.

Research interests that fit under the broad umbrella of Advances in Sourcing include aspects directly relating to sourcing decisions, organizing and governing sourcing relationships, traditional and online sourcing models, digital sourcing platforms and sourcing outcomes/performance for various sourcing arrangements; viewed from different perspectives (e.g., client and/or supplier firm, crowdsourcing platform and/or individual actors), and studied with different levels of analysis and using different methods.

To capture the dynamics of the sourcing phenomenon, this SIG aims to promote emerging issues and topics of this rapidly evolving phenomenon, which is reflected in the title as “Advances”.

Overall, SIG Sourcing seeks to contribute to the development and refinement of the members' knowledge on sourcing, and to enhance the quality and acceptability of sourcing research in the IS discipline. We seek to achieve the above objectives through seminars, conferences, and on-line resources.

Member Benefits

The SIG Sourcing aims to provide an enabling forum in which IS academics, postgraduate students, and practitioners can:
  • Discover and discuss new and emerging trends associated with and/or having implication for sourcing
  • Exchange ideas with other members related but not limited to new theoretical lenses, research methods, positioning of studies and potential theoretical contributions in this highly practical area of research
  • Foster research collaborations
  • Critically examine new research opportunities, new research ideas, and problems in conducting research on sourcing issues
  • Improve the quality of IS sourcing research by organizing and participating in events (such as pre- or post-ICIS workshops or the annual Global Sourcing Workshop) and developing and consuming sourcing-related resources (such as research curations)

News

The 16th Digital Sourcing, Platforms and Ecosystems Workshop (2025)

Following the success of the past workshops (previously known as the Global Sourcing Workshop), we are pleased to release this Call for Papers for the 16th Digital Sourcing, Platforms and Ecosystems Workshop held March 4-7, 2025, in Obergurgl, Austria.

ECIS 2024 track related to sourcing

The European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS) 2024 in Paphos, Cyprus, will host a track on IS Strategy, Governance and Sourcing in the Digital Age (track chairs: Thomas Huber, Oliver Krancher, Ilan Oshri). The track is an excellent platform for research related to IS Sourcing. Submission deadline is November 17th, 2023. See the call for papers

SIG Sourcing Event 2023

The SIG Sourcing Annual Meeting took place as a virtual event on Dec 4th, 2023. The event featured a guest talk by Thomas Fischer on the IS Sourcing Journey of a Swiss Bank, a Paper Development Workshop including work on crowdsourcing and platforms, and the awards ceremony. Congratulations to the award winners.