Enviropreneurial Orientation and Industry 4.0: Mediating the Role of Enviropreneurial Marketing in an Emerging Economy

Customers are willing to pay extra for environmentally friendly goods and services, which is providing new challenges and opportunities for entrepreneurs. This study intends to investigate the impact of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) on Industry 4.0 (I4.0) practices of small and medium-sized businesses in light of this scenario and to analyze the mediating role of enviropreneurial marketing (EM) strategy between EO and I4.0 practices. Drawing upon the resource advantage theory and the dynamic capability view (DCV), a framework is developed. A survey approach is adopted to collect data from the owners/managers of 257 electrical and electronics (E&E) small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Malaysia. To test the study hypotheses, structural equation modeling (SEM) using the partial least squares (PLS) technique is adopted. The findings reveal that enviropreneurial orientation and enviropreneurial marketing strategy have positively influenced Industry 4.0 practices in the SMEs of an emerging economy. Furthermore, the results highlight that enviropreneurial marketing strategy positively transmits the effect of enviropreneurial orientation to I4.0 practices. The study outcomes offer some novel contributions and implications to practitioners and researchers.