Search results

Firms must be constantly looking for markets and business opportunities and developing new products; to do so, they must find ways to increase their competitiveness, productivity so that it is noticed in their financial statements. The purpose of this paper is to establish the influence of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) in business performance (BP) of small and medium-sized enterprises of the manufacturing sector in Mexico. Likewise, it is intended to demonstrate how absorptive capacity (ACAP) allows moderating this important relation.

Analyzing important theoretical and empirical contributions as regards this topic, a survey was designed and applied to 165 manufacturing firms, and by means of partial least squares structural equation modeling resorting to SmartPLS, the research hypotheses were tried.

The obtained results indicate that indeed, EO positively influences BP; in like manner, ACAP has a moderating effect on this relation. Thereby, it can be established that the manufacturing sector carries out the right practices that aim at increasing entrepreneurial competitiveness.

The main limitation of the paper is its regional scale, not national; however, the typology of the manufacturing sector in the country is very similar, as the analyzed subsectors are the most relevant at a national level. Moreover, the existence of international value chains is also found in the rest of the country, so these chains are not exclusive to the region. Another limitation is that even if the analysis focuses on the main manufacturing subsectors, it would have been interesting to analyze if the behavior is similar in other subsectors.

This paper contributes to broadening the studies on EO, ACAP and BP in a different context. Besides, it allows contrasting the results obtained in an eminently manufacturing country with other economies less dependent on this sector. It also contributes to broadening the multidimensional analysis of the manufacturing sector in Mexico, as the authors of the present paper have also performed studies over similar lines in the same sector.

The purpose of the present paper is to analyse the impact of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and customer orientation (Co.) on innovation in the restaurant industry, as well as how innovation also positively influences financial and market performance. Likewise, it is analysed whether human capital (HC) and competitive strategy (CS) have a moderating effect between innovation and performance.

To reach the stated goals, a survey was applied to 129 entrepreneurs in the restaurant industry in Baja California, Mexico and using partial least squares structural equation modelling, the research hypotheses were verified.

Results indicate that EO and Co positively influence innovation, which also furthers better financial and market firm performance; however, no moderating effect was found for HC nor CS.

The findings allow contributing from a practical-entrepreneurial standpoint, as it raises awareness about the importance of developing strategies that allow efficiently gaining knowledge to encourage a culture in the restaurant industry focused on EO and Co, which, for their part, will boost the design and implementation of innovations.

The paper contributes to understanding the behaviour of HC and CS, which may have an influence or not, depending on the role they have within a system.

This paper contributes to raising awareness of the importance of developing strategies that allow efficient knowledge to foster a culture in the restaurant industry focused on entrepreneurship and clientele.

The purpose of this article is to study the moderating effect of absorptive capacity, defined as the set of organizational routines and processes through which companies acquire, assimilate, transform and exploit knowledge to produce a dynamic organizational capacity (Zahra and George, 2002), in three strategic orientations: market orientation; technology orientation and entrepreneurial orientation and their positive relationship in the performance of the medium and large Mexican manufacturing firms. Likewise, it is determined whether these three combined SOs influence firm performance.

The data was collected from 171 medium and large-sized Mexican manufacturing firms. The proposed hypotheses are tested using partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).

Despite the importance of knowledge for the development of firms, the results indicate that the moderating effect of absorptive capacity is only present in the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation and firm performance. That is, firms cannot take advantage of knowledge simultaneously between the three strategic orientations. For their part, market orientation and entrepreneurial orientation exert a positive influence on firm performance.

The main practical implication for the manufacturing industry is that they must develop mechanisms to detect what kind of knowledge affects each strategic orientation, in this way it can make the absorptive capacity influence the relationships between SO and FP.

The main contribution consists of studying the moderating effect of the absorptive capacity on the relationship between three strategic orientations and firm performance, and not concentrating solely on the simultaneous use of these strategies as is commonly done.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically test the relationship between the various components of intellectual capital (IC) (human, organizational, technological and relational) and organization performance (OP) in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the manufacturing sector in the region of Baja California, Mexico.

A sample of 127 surveys was applied to CEOs, CFOs or managers of SMEs. In order to test the research hypotheses, a multiple regression was run prior to the development of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses.

The results showed that the four capitals have a positive influence on OP; the evidence is consistent with several studies in Mexico and abroad. Furthermore, knowledge management was introduced as a moderating variable and the result was that it negatively moderates the relationship between IC and OP.

The main limitation of this research is that it only focused on one region and a single sector in Mexico. However, future research at the national level might verify the hypotheses tested.

This research contributes to enrich the theoretical framework for the Mexican context regarding IC; additionally, it allows contrasting the evidence with other studies at national and international levels.