The Mediating Role of Competitive Strategies in the Effect of Firm Competencies and Export Performance

The objective of this research is to study the mediating role of competitive strategies in affecting the aspects of firm competencies such as production capability, marketing and sales capability and information competency, and export performance. A questionnaire was used for data collection which was randomly distributed among 200 of managers and export experts of top export companies in Iran. SMART PLS and SPSS software were used for the data analysis. The results of the data analysis showed that competitive strategies mediate the effect of production capability and export performance. However competitive strategies do not mediate the effect of marketing competency and export performance. The results of structural equation modeling show that the research model has a proper goodness-of-fit. (C) 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.