Collaborations, as a natural selection of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) in the business environment, have been extensively studied. However, the core theoretical underpinnings, as well as recent research directions and themes have not been investigated. This study aims to holistically review the extant body of knowledge pertaining to SME collaboration, thereby clarifying these instances. Drawing upon a corpus of 978 scholarly articles retrieved from the Scopus database, spanning the years 1982 to 2022, this study implements a bibliometric analysis utilizing the VOSviewer software to map the intellectual landscape and discern patterns within the literature. The co-citation analysis depicted four primary theoretical constructs: those pertaining to relationship, open innovation, capability, and performance. The bibliographic coupling analysis depicted the prevailing trends in collaborative endeavors, encompassing supply chain, R&D, coopetition, Industry 4.0, internationalization, and open innovation. Furthermore, the application of co-occurrence analysis facilitated the delineation of five distinct research themes within this domain. The investigation extends to a critical discussion on the prospective orientation and concludes with an examination of the its implications, offering insights for the research, managers, and policymakers.

We examine the effects of innovation, productivity and export on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the Swedish wood manufacturing sector. Previous studies have produced mixed results on these topics, which may be due to methodological limitations, contextual differences and inadequate operationalisation of key variables. To address these gaps, we adopt a more specific and rigorous approach, focusing on product innovation and using sophisticated statistical methods to account for endogeneity and other confounding factors. We use a longitudinal dataset to analyse how SMEs select into export markets and learn from exporting, as well as how other factors influence their export performance. We find that innovation and export have a nonlinear relationship, which depends on the level of interaction between SMEs and their international customers, and the degree of fit between their innovative products and the export market. In particular, when SMEs have high international customer engagement, they are more likely to innovate in ways that enhance their export potential. Regarding productivity, we find that self-selection is more advantageous for SMEs, while learning-by-exporting is more consistent in controlling for unobserved factors. © 2024 The Author(s). The World Economy published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

This model considers a course as a new journey for students, so teachers should design the journey to be more enjoyable and engaging and help students to reach their destination. Generally, there are three essential issues that should be at the center of attention: 

• Student journey map
• Course profile
• Collaboration strategies