Entrepreneurial orientation, marketing capabilities and performance: The Moderating role of Competitive Intensity on Latin American International New Ventures

International new ventures (INVs) face constant competitive intensity, which serves to increase the already high difficulty of enhancing marketing capabilities to gain superior performance in foreign markets. International entrepreneurship (IE) literature suggests that entrepreneurial orientation (EO) may influence INVs' performance. However, EO can be a resource-consuming strategic orientation, and INVs face resource constraints. Specifically, the literature expresses doubts as to whether increasing levels of EO are favorable for all INVs, all the time. From the resource-based view (RBV) perspective, the present paper extends previous IE research by investigating whether the degree to which EO and corresponding marketing capabilities vary under differing competitive intensities when enhancing performance. The findings highlight the moderating role of competitive intensity between EO and marketing capabilities for better INV performance. These have important implications for the decisions of IE scholars and practitioners about EO allocation in order to enhance the required marketing capabilities for INV's increased performance. The survey data consist of Mexican INVs, where the emphasis on constrained resources is high as are the competitive intensity challenges that these firms face in foreign markets. Therefore, this study contributes to the almost wholly ignored research about Latin American new venture internationalization and performance debate. (C) 2015 Elsevier Inc All rights reserved.