Entrepreneurial Orientation and SME Performance: The Serial Mediating Effects of Access to Finance and Competitive Advantage

is widely recognised as crucial sectors to the growth of internal market as well as international market. Even so, the statistics showed that they depicted of high mortality rate predominantly during their first three years of start-up phase. Recognizing the requisite study to find out the causes behind this issue, numerous prior scholars have done the research about determinants of SME performance. Consequently, previous works always related performance with Resource-based view (RBV) theory, whereby, resources and capabilities in firm level is significant to retain competitive advantage and sustain performance. Motivated to RBV theory, this research purposes to examine the factors of business performance and serial mediating effect by mapping entrepreneurial orientation as capability and access to external financial as resource which could generate competitive advantage and eventually increase SME performance. A data of 284 SMEs was proportionate stratified randomly selected analysed by using Structural Equation Model (AMOS-SEM). Resulting this, this current study highlighted that the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation and SME performance was partially serial mediated by access to external finance and competitive advantage. The study stimuli the authorities such as policy makers and support systems including entrepreneurs, that entrepreneurial orientation and access to external financial resource by SME would offer competitive advantage in the firm which to conclude enhance business performance. Upcoming studies may expand this research via adding and probing either internal or external critical factors that significant to the variant of SME performance.