MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY ------------------ PHAM THU VAN IMPACTS OF CREDIT ACCESS AND INNOVATION ON FIRM PERFORMANCE IN VIETNAM PHD DISSERTATION IN ECONOMICS HANOI - 2024 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY ----------------------- PHAM THU VAN IMPACTS OF CREDIT ACCESS AND INNOVATION ON FIRM PERFORMANCE IN VIETNAM SPECIALIZATION: ECONOMICS SPECIALIZATION CODE: 9310101 PHD DISSERTATION Supervisor: Dr. VU TUAN ANH HANOI - 2024 DECLARATION I have read and comprehended the University's policy on plagiarism and academic integrity violations. With my own honor, I certify that this research was carried out by me and that it does not violate regulations of good academic practice. PhD candidate i TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION .i TABLE OF CONTENTS.
ii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS .iv LIST OF FIGURES. v LIST OF TABLES .vi CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION. Reasons for choosing the topic. Research objectives and questions.
Subject and scope of the research. Original contributions of the research. Structure of the dissertation. 6 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ON ACCESS TO CREDIT, INNOVATION AND FIRM PERFORMANCE.
Factors affecting firm performance. Impacts of access to credit to firm performance. Impacts of innovation to firm performance. 31 CHAPTER 3: THE THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ON THE THEORY OF THE GROWTH OF THE FIRM.
Neoclassical theory of firm growth. The natural of firm by Coase (1937). Williamson: Evolution and formalization of Transaction cost theory. The development of the transaction theory by Hart (1986, 1990, 1997).
Summarize the neoclassical theory of firm growth. Penrose’s “The theory of the growth of firm”. Resource - based theory. 39 CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH METHODS.
The research context. Description of variables. Characteristics of the sample. Access to credit on firm performance.
Innovation on firm performance. The combination effects of access to credit and innovation to firm performance. Impact of access to credit to firm performance. Impact of innovation to firm performance.
The combination effects of access to credit and innovation to firm performance. 98 CHAPTER 6: DISCUSSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS. Discussions of the findings of the research. Recommendations for researchers and practitioners.
Recommendations for policy makers. Limitations and future research direction .115 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS Abbreviations Full form SMEs Small and Medium Enterprises PCI Provincial Competitiveness Index VCCI The Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry WB World Bank CIEM The Central Institute for Economic Management DANIDA Danish International Development Agency USAID The United States Agency for International Development VND Vietnam Dong USD US Dollar ATC Access to credit NATC Non-access to credit GDP Gross Domestic Production LIST OF FIGURES Figure 4.1: Contributions of SMEs to business sector in Vietnam, 2006-2015 (%) .2: Number of SMEs in Vietnam, 2006-2015 .3: Total employment of SMEs in Vietnam, 2006-2015 .4: Total capital of SMEs in Vietnam, 2006-2015 .5: Major obstacles SMEs face in Vietnam (% of SMEs).6: SME sample by firm size and formality status .7: SME sample by manufacturing industries. 61 vi LIST OF TABLES Table 4.1: Enterprise size categories by capital scale and labor scale. Description of Variables .3: Vietnam’s non-state and household manufacturing by province in 2005 .4: Number of interviewed enterprises by year: province and formality status.
Descriptive statistics of variables. Labour productivity and firm size by access to credit. The difference of firm performance between innovative and non-innovative firms. First stage regression: Determinants of access to credit.
Testing for endogeneity. Second stage IV regression: Access to credit and labour productivity. Difference of labour productivity by access to credit. Access to credit and revenue and value added.
Further empirical results on access to credit and firm performance .10: Access to formal credit and firm performance .11: Access to informal credit and firm performance. Factors affecting firm’s innovation. Hausman test of model selection: Fixed-effects or Random-effects. Innovation and firm performance: Labor productivity.
Innovation and firm performance: Revenue. Innovation and firm performance: Value added. Robustness check: Innovation and firm growth. Combination effects to firm performance.
98 vi CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1. Reasons for choosing the topic It is firmly believed that credit is a crucial issue of operating and running enterprises. Manaresi and Pierri (2019) analyze data from Italian corporations over more than a decade to estimate the impact of idiosyncratic changes in credit supply on firms' total factor productivity growth. They find that improved access to credit significantly boosts IT adoption, innovation, exporting, and the implementation of superior management practices, which in turn positively affect the total factor productivity growth of firms.
“Without adequate access to financing, the staying power of the business and its potential for growth is jeopardised” (Rahaman 2011, p. Akoten et al.941) affirm that “better access to credit improves firm performance”. Hence, credit and expanding credit access are among key factors of firm’s growth and development (Phan and Archer, 2020). It is essential for firms to have access to external credit as their self-funding or internal capital is often insufficient for their business operations (Khandker, Samad and Ali, 2013).
Particularly for SMEs, they have a high demand for access to external financing to run their business, create new products, enhance employees’ knowledge and skills, and equip more production facilities (Atieno, 2009). Nevertheless, it has never been straightforward for SMEs to obtain credit and other banking services at affordable rates (Rahaman, 2011). This group of enterprises appear to be more credit rationed than do larger firms (Nguyen, Su and Sharma, 2019; Tran and Santarelli, 2013). Our study is motivated by the Theory of the growth of the firm and Resource – based theory that mainly focus on the connection between scare resource and the growth of the firm.
Following Grant (1991), we divide a firm's resources into two main types: tangible resources and intangible resources. Accordingly, tangible resources are financial resources; Tangible assets are technological innovation, including new products, improvements of technologies or processes, new technologies and processes. Previous studies highlight that credit is a key factor for growth and development of small and medium-sized enterprises (Akoten et al., 2006; Phan and Archer, 2020; Rand et al. These enterprises form a large part of the private sector in most countries, particularly in developing ones like Vietnam.
In Asian countries, SMEs take 1 up to 90 percent of all enterprises and create 50 to 80 percent of all jobs. In Vietnam, SMEs account for 95 percent of total enterprises nationwide, create about 77 percent of total employment, and contribute up to 48 percent of GDP (VCCI, 2013). Regardless of their significance in the economy, SMEs appear to face multiple risks such as loss of major suppliers, failure of a partnership, competitiveness from other enterprises, etc. Among the obstacles that SMEs have confronted, the shortage of and difficulty in access to capital are likely to be the most serious problems, followed by the competitiveness, the restriction on the demands for products, the difficulties in land access and business premises (Clusel et al.
A study by Nguyen, Su and Sharma (2019) affirms that SMEs often encounter more financial obstacles than do their large counterparts – such as inadequate collateral, high interest rate, or complex process of credit application. SMEs are considered the weakest and the most vulnerable group once the economy is fluctuated as their operations mainly rely on the borrowing funds (Clusel et al. SMEs seek credit from formal and informal financial sources. The former arises from institutional venture capital financing, initial public offering, loans from commercial banks and other formal financial institutions, etc.
The latter includes borrowing from friends, family members, relatives, private moneylenders, and trade creditors. According to Pecking Order theory (Myers, 1984) and the M-M theory (Modigliani & Miller, 1958), firms prefer using financing from internal sources due to the adverse selection problem. With regard to external financing sources, the prioritise using debt over equity to utilise the cheaper cost of capital and the tax shield’s benefit. Apparently, firms remain their preferences for using internal financing, such as retained earnings, then debt, and equity.
This type of financing offers SMEs the simpler process of access to credit, non-bureaucracy, low transaction costs and lending interest rates, and high flexibility of repayment conditions (Cao, 2014). Therefore, this dissertation focuses on the impacts of debt finance to firms. Along with credit, innovation has played a crucial role for firms to develop and survive in the context of increasing globalisation and global value chains, particularly for small and medium enterprises in developing countries (e., Archer, Sharma, and Su, 2020). Firms of all industries in general and those in manufacturing industries in particular have been aware of the needs of engaging in innovation activities to increase their competitiveness, survival and success in the markets (Saunila, 2020).
Literature has widely discussed the strengths and weaknesses of SMEs when engaging in 2 innovation (e., Archer, Sharma, and Su, 2020; Love and Roper, 2015). Given the advantages, smaller firms tend to have rapid decision-making, be more willing to take risks when adopting new technology and/or production processes, and be more flexible in response to new market opportunities (Love and Roper, 2015). However, small firms experience disadvantages due to the economies of scale shown through a lower level of cost savings as per the number of goods manufactured, less production efficiency, and lack of specialist resources. Thus, innovation is a key driver for small businesses to enhance their productivity and firm performances.
A recent definition of innovation has been given as “a process, namely an activity of creating a new product or service, new technology, new organization, or enhancement of existing product or service using existing technologic processes and organizations” (Ramadani and Gërguri, 2011, p. Engaging in innovation activities will improve small firms’ competitiveness with their larger and more resource possessing competitors as well as their long-term success in the markets (Ramadani et al. Our analysis builds on a large literature examining the impacts of innovation and innovation–firm performance relationships, in which findings are varied (for a review, see Saunila, 2020). On one hand, previous studies have found the positive association between innovation and firm performance, suggesting that innovative firms perform better than their non-innovative counterparts.
For example, Lee, Lee and Garrett (2019) find the positive effect of new product and firm performance with launching marketing innovation for high-tech businesses as well as the positive relationship between process innovation and firm performance with introducing organisational innovation for low- tech companies. In the same vein, Hanelt et al. (2021) show that digital innovation improves firm performance. On the other hand, earlier studies have also shown the negative effects or no statistically significant influence of innovation on firm performance.
For example, Koellinger (2008) shows that innovative activity is not necessarily associated with a higher level of firm’s profitability. Artz et al. (2010) find that firm’s patents have a negative impact on both return on assets and sales growth. Similarly, Canh et al.
(2019) emphasise that process and product innovations have no benefits to return on total assets. These studies argue that innovation is a risky and expensive activity, resulting in more disadvantages for firms during their operations, such as making firms more exposed to market risk, experiencing higher costs and employee dissatisfaction as well as unwarranted changes (e., Simpson, Siguaw, and 3 Enz, 2006). Previous empirical evidence has established a link between credit access and firm performance. In the context of Vietnam, Giang et al.
(2019) examined the causal effect of access to finance on the total factor productivity of Vietnamese SMEs and found that the ability of firms to secure formal credit from financial institutions significantly increases their total factor productivity. Similarly, Tran and Santarelli (2013) used business operating profit and growth of sales to represent the business performance of Vietnamese SMEs, highlighting the need to research the relationship between credit access and firm performance.