Research aims: This study estimates the role of research and development (R&D) expense with respect to the export intensity of Vietnamese enterprises.
Design/Methodology/Approach: Building upon the resource-based review, this study postulates that the R&D expenses of an enterprise are positively associated with the export intensity of the enterprise.Dat a extracted from the Vietnam General Statistics Office Survey of 306 exporting Vietnamese firms were used to test the proposed hypothesis.
Research Findings: Both Robust Standard Errors and Tobit Regression models reveal that the hypothesis is strongly supported with the control of firm-level and national-level factors.
Theoretical contribution/Originality: This study provides a new insight about the role of R&D expense with respect to the export intensity of the enterprise in transition economies.
Practitioner/Policy Implications: This study suggests firms to continuously engage in innovation to gain a sustainable competitive advantage when exporting to other countries.
Research limitation/ Implication: Further research may consider a bigger sample size and utilise time-series or panel data.