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The purpose of this paper is to provide a systematic and updated assessment of studies on key exporting stimuli for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and to propose a research agenda on this topic.

The authors develop a review of empirical articles on SMEs’ exporting stimuli and outline future research directions based on key emerging drivers.

Research on SMEs’ exporting drivers focuses mainly on human resources’ competences, skills and subjective characteristics and on the role of relevant network actors (customers, intermediaries).

This paper provides an original contribution with regard to updating the framework on export drivers by Leonidou et al. (2007), highlighting an emerging research perspective based on internal/external network dimensions and proposing future research directions on internal individual and organisational actors and on new external network actors.

Various barriers discourage small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) from entering or expanding their export activities in the international markets, especially SMEs in emerging markets. The purpose of this study is to look at capacity building to accelerate SMEs’ export performance.

This study draws on contingency theory and takes a resource-based and market-based view to provide a holistic understanding of the issue. This study uses primary data collected via extensive surveys from active SMEs in three main industrial regions in Vietnam to undertake confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling for quantitative analysis.

The results confirm and show the significant effects of various determinants on firms’ export performance. These research findings have scientific contribution and significant implications by understanding the effective internal and external export drivers and mediators in an emerging market and enhancing SMEs’ export performance.

This study helps SMEs to improve their export performance by systemizing their decision-making in export activities, improving main export drivers highlighted in this study and developing required training programs for their teams. The outcomes also helps policymakers and regulators to improve the current SME ecosystem in Vietnam through training programs, improving policies, facilitating trades, providing more government assistance etc. The results of this study can be extended to other emerging markets with a similar economic structure and legal system.

Given the need for more work on export performance, this paper develops and tests a holistic conceptual framework that accounts for all aspects of export drivers, and provides a more comprehensive model for examining SMEs’ export drivers. This theoretical framework also incorporates three potential mediators (i.e. innovation strategy, export marketing strategy and business strategy) to investigate the effect of internal and external factors on export performance, highlighting the importance of the mediating effects on SMEs in achieving growth and competing in the international arena.

To highlight the relative importance of service‐specific export performance drivers that help successful exporting.

A gap between the antecedents of manufacturing and service firms was identified via an extensive review on the export performance as well as services literature. Taking the resource‐based view and the contingency approach, a series of research propositions relating to the determinants of export performance among service firms are developed.

This paper suggests that traditional export performance models, developed for and tested with manufacturing firms, cannot be assumed to apply equally well in service settings. Further, service specific export theory needs to adopt a contingency approach which in turn provides insightful and value‐added research for academics and practitioners in the services exporting sector.

The paper provides recognition of the relative importance of the different export performance and value drivers; value propositions can be more effectively designed in order to gain competitive advantage.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the influence of determinants on early internationalization in the context of an emerging economy, i.e. India.

The study is based on an ex post facto exploratory research using primary data collected from a sample of 102 exporting small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Bangalore.

The overall results reveal that it is the proactive entrepreneurs and their previous experience that determine the early internationalization of SMEs. Further, competitive constraint was a major obstacle to enter the international market at an early age for late internationalized SMEs.

The policy initiatives should aim to develop the international orientation of the entrepreneurs in the firm as a precursor for the formulation and subsequent implementation of internationalization strategies.

Although studies have been conducted on determinants and early internationalization, these are confined to a few dimensions, and none of the studies have looked into the issues affecting the early internationalization holistically and with respect to SMEs in India.

This study aims to examine a conceptual integrated framework for small- and medium-sized enterprises’ (SMEs) export performance that comprises all potential export determinants and inhibitors. This study also incorporates and examines the potential mediators of proactiveness (business strategy), innovativeness (innovation strategy) and export marketing strategy.

His research is based on the contingency theory, resource-based and market-based view, and it provides an integrated model about the research problem. The primary data are collected through direct survey amongst active SME exporters, and three main approaches of descriptive statistics, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modelling are applied for data analysis.

The results show significant effects of various internal and external firms’ determinants on their export performance in Qatar. Two mediators, proactiveness (business strategy) and innovativeness (innovation strategy), have key roles in enhancing SMEs’ export as well. The final research findings have significant implications for understanding all key drivers of SME export in Qatar, and it helps policymakers, regulators and service providers to improve the current SME ecosystem and their services to SMEs. Finally, the results of this study can be extended to other emerging markets with similar economic and legal structures.

Many obstacles discourage SMEs to move internationally, especially in emerging markets. This study focuses on the capacity building to enhance SME export activities in an emerging market. Even though the latest literature in the area of export performance has focused on firms from emerging economies, studies in this area are still limited. Earlier research in this area has mostly focused solely on the determinants of export performance from either internal factors, external factors or both without using adequately potential mediating factors, which could affect export performance.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the determinants of two distinct geographic pathways to internationalization for small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs). Regional and global pathways are juxtaposed to study the influence on export performance of selected key intangible resources, namely, innovation, human resource management, networking and the firm's experience.

Building upon a resource‐based view of the firm, Tobit regression models are used to test the hypotheses on a sample of 2,657 Italian manufacturing firms.

The paper provides empirical evidence that the determinants of SME export performance vary in line with the geographic scope of internationalization. While product innovation (innovation) positively impacts on SME export performance, irrespective of export destination, other factors do so selectively. For example, location in industrial districts (networking) and the deployment of external managers (human resource management) exclusively exert their positive impact respectively on regional and global export performance. The firm's age (experience) does not seem to guarantee success on regional or global export markets.

Investing in product innovation and hiring specialist non‐family executives are associated with success on global export markets. Industry clustering provides the resources that are useful for internationalization up to a point (export growth in regional markets), but it is not effective in the case of expansion on distant international markets.

Exporting beyond the regional market exposes firms to the liability of foreignness to a greater degree, thus requiring more dedicated and specialized resources and competences. This paper supports the hypothesis that export drivers differ between regional and global markets and calls for a definition of export performance that distinguishes between them.

The success of the Australian wine industry is well documented. However, there have been few comparative studies of the reasons for this success as compared to Australia's main competitors. Most of the anecdotal evidence and trade publications focus on “value for money” and fruit‐driven wines, without looking at how the Australian wine businesses operate. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the external environment in France and Australia as one of the drivers for Australian wine sector success.

In‐depth interviews with two French and two Australian wineries and a review of the literature led to a series of hypotheses about the role of market orientation, strategic orientation, innovative and entrepreneurial environment orientation, constraining legislation, industry infrastructure usage, industry plan support, and interorganizational collaboration as factors differentiating the two countries. An online survey of wineries in the two countries resulted in a sample of 82 French and 63 Australian responses. An analysis of variance revealed significant differences between Australian wineries as compared to the French.

Australian wineries rated themselves higher in market orientation, growth strategy, export proactiveness, perceived innovative environment, perceived entrepreneurial environment, more interorganizational collaboration, and less perceived constraining legislation.

These results not only provide some basis for Australia's success in wine exporting, but also add to the literature on the effect of the external environment on business performance.

Wine exporting countries can use the results to help shape policy for creating a more conducive environment for exporting wine.

This study aims to analyze the complexities of the Brazilian soybean supply chain (SSC) and develop strategic interventions to improve the origin system’s performance.

This study used stakeholder interviews to identify the SSC bottlenecks and determine and assess drivers of competitiveness. A methodological framework based on the systems thinking approach for developing long-term structural changes was used. The problem was structured using behavior over time graph and causal loop modeling to propose three investment strategies to solve the logistics problem in SSC.

This study highlights the gaps in coordination between stakeholders and the public sector regarding the public policy for infrastructure investment. Three strategic interventions were developed to address the agro-industrial logistical problem, namely, investment in storage, multimodal transport systems and improvements in existing transport infrastructure. To overcome transport and storage logistics limitations, the authors suggest different forms of partnerships, including public-private partnerships.

This research is limited to evaluating an agricultural commodity (soybean) and does not include its by-products. The sample of stakeholders was limited and the boundary of analysis was Brazil. Nevertheless, the study showed how strategic interventions could be developed following a holistic analysis.

The proposed integrated approach illustrates the development of three strategic initiatives. It can be implemented by stakeholders, including the public sector, which is the basis for providing assertive long-term investments in Brazilian logistics.

The SSC analysis could promote the implementation of systemically determined interventions and strategies. It could significantly improve the performance of agricultural systems and help the formulation of public policies aimed at rural development.

The use of system dynamics to identify intervention points is an essential contribution to mitigating the SSC’s hindrances. Moreover, the combining methodologies resulted in comprehensive intervention strategies.

The purpose of this paper is to build on the resource-based view to analyze the influence of location effects on a firm's ability to develop export-related resources and capabilities which then impacts on export performance.

To test the proposed hypotheses, a sample of small-to-medium exporting firms located in Australia is analyzed using partial least squared modeling.

The findings show that access to location specific advantages (i.e. access to sources of supply, government agencies, export-related services and infrastructure, managerial labor skills, and network opportunities) are essential antecedents for the firm's ability to develop export-related resources and capabilities which in turn drives export performance outcomes.

Results from this study are from one state in Australia, and caution should be exercised when generalizing findings to other geographic regions.

These findings suggest that location effects do indeed present challenges to regional SME firms. Indeed the substantial impacts of sourcing experienced managerial staff with export-related skills affirm the critical role of human resources. This offers insights concerning the recruitment and reward policies for remote firms having to compete with firms in more attractive or sort after metropolitan locations. Also the findings suggest that managers should give serious thought to the appropriateness of the resources and capabilities needed to increase their export performance.

Even though the role and importance of firm location has been highlighted in the export literature, previous export studies have not focussed on dimensions of location as antecedents to firm resources and capability development.

The purpose of this research is to explore how location – regional vs metropolitan – impacts a small to medium‐sized enterprise (SME)'s access to firm resources and capabilities, and in turn its export performance.

This study involved collecting qualitative data from an expert panel of government trade advisors, as well as managers of SME exporters in Australian regional and metropolitan areas. The data were used to explore three propositions relating to the impact of location.

The data provides support for the propositions that location impacts SME exporters’ access to networks and export related infrastructure/services, and in turn export performance. Firms in metropolitan areas have an advantage over those in regional areas. However, contrary to expectations, the relatively lower level of competition in regional areas did not appear to have a negative impact on the export performance of firms located in these areas.

The study confirms the importance of exploring the impact of location on export performance. However, the exploratory nature of the study means that results cannot necessarily be generalised beyond the setting in which the data were collected. Future research should examine the impact of location for exporters in a broader sample of countries.

The disadvantages for SME exporters located in regional areas that come from a lack of networks and export related infrastructure/services need to be recognized and addressed by the managers of SME exporters and their advisors. The study also highlights the importance of the location decision for these firms.

This study is one of the first to explicitly focus on the impact of location on the export performance of SMEs. While exploratory in nature, it highlights the need for further research to better understand this potentially critical moderating variable and both its practical and theoretical implications.