BUILDING SUSTAINED COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE THROUGH TECHNOLOGY RESOURCES AND INTERNATIONAL COMPETITIVENESS

Crude palm oil is one of the mainstays of Indonesia's exports. In the midst of intense competition with vegetable oil producing countries in the world, Indonesia must have international competitiveness which is strongly supported by the technology in order to achieve a sustained competitive advantage. The major purpose of this paper is to examine the direct effect of technological resources to international competitiveness and sustained competitive advantage as well as measure the mediating effect of international competitiveness in the relationship between technological resources and sustained competitive advantage. For these purposes, an empirical survey was conducted with the active participation of 82 palm oil industries in Indonesia. In addition to the survey, in-depth interviews were conducted to follow up the quantitative results. On the basis of path analysis with SmartPLS, technology resources had positive and significant effect to sustained competitive advantage. This study suggests the importance of technological resources in achieving sustained competitive advantage on the part of palm oil industries in developing countries.