It is an unresolved issue whether insertion of emerging market firms into global value chains (GVCs) is a better way of internationalisation than developing own export products and independent sales channels–as has been the ‘conventional’ internationalisation path of firms from mature market economies. On the basis of unique firm survey data from Vietnam, we compare two groups of exporters in terms of ‘global connectivity’–that is, how well a firm can connect directly to global markets–and economic and strategic export performance. One group of Vietnamese firms includes basically independent exporters that are only weakly connected to GVCs. The other group consists of original equipment manufacturers (OEM) exporters, characterised by high dependency on GVCs. Using ANOVA, SEM and regression analyses, we find that the two groups of firms differ significantly as regards global connectivity and economic and strategic export performance, but less so in terms of the relationship between global connectivity and export performance.
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