To confirm the moderating role of competitive intensity on the IT capabilities–CE relationship, we further tested mediated moderation using PLS’s structural model. In mediated moderation, the interaction between the independent variable and the moderator influences the dependent variable through a mediator [23]. To this end, we tested whether the relationship between IT capabilities (the independent variable) and CE (the mediator) was moderated by competitive intensity (the moderator) and whether CE, in turn, influenced product innovation performance (the dependent variable)