The Effects of International Entrepreneurship Characteristics on Export Performance of Small and Medium Enterprises in Thailand

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to study the effects of international entrepreneurship characteristics on export performance of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Thailand. This study was based on the literature review and related theories: international entrepreneurship and competitive advantage in order to describe the characteristics of international entrepreneurship in two aspects as entrepreneurial orientation and innovativeness. Therefore, this led to three research questions: 1) How do entrepreneurial orientation and innovativeness have causal relationship to export performance of Thai SMEs? 2) How do entrepreneurial orientation and innovativeness have causal relationship to export performance of Thai SMEs through reconfiguration capability? 3) How do entrepreneurial orientation and innovativeness have causal relationship to export performance of Thai SMEs increase with favorable competitive environment? This dissertation was quantitative research. The population in this study were Small and Medium Enterprises who engaged in export business and registered with the Ministry of Commerce and the samples were 238 SMEs who were respondents to the questionnaire collected by mail and locations. The research instrument was questionnaire and the statistics used to analyze data was descriptive and structural Model Analysis. The results of the research were as follows: research question 1 in model 1 entrepreneurial orientation (β = 0.274, p<0.01) and innovativeness (β = 0.449, p<0.001) had direct effect between the variance of the export performance. This was different from the results in model 2, model 3, model 4a and model 4b showed that entrepreneurial orientation and innovativeness had no direct effect to export performance but had indirectly effect to export performance through reconfiguration capability, which was the mediating variable. The results from the research question 2 showed that in model 2 had indirect path that mediating by reconfiguration capability from entrepreneurial orientation to export performance (β = 0.753, p<0.01) and innovativeness to export performance (β = 1.428, p<0.001), in model 3 had indirect path that mediating by reconfiguration capability from entrepreneurial orientation to export performance (β = 0.970, p<0.001), and innovativeness to export performance (β = 1.667, p<0.001), in model 4a had indirect path that mediating by reconfiguration capability from entrepreneurial orientation to export performance (β = 0.779, p<0.001) and innovativeness to export performance (β = 1.302, p<0.001), and in model 4b had indirect path that mediating by reconfiguration capability from entrepreneurial orientation to export performance (β = 0.727, p<0.05), and innovativeness to export performance (β = 1.420,p<0.001). The results from the research question 3 in model 4a, and model 4b showed that entrepreneurial orientation (β = 0.124, p<0.05), and innovativeness (β = 0.232, p<0.01) had direct effect on export performance increase with favorable competitive environment as the moderator variable, respectively.