  In a context of global economy, addressing SMEs performance within a local
framework appears rather a naive approach. The key drawback of such an approach
stems from its restriction to socio-economic factors that might lead to biased
decisions regarding potential venues for performance improvement. In practice,
the key objective of performance analysis consists in identifying benchmarks
for best managerial practices with respect to resource allocation as well as
production level setting. Conducting the analysis within a specific country,
let it be a developing country, may be misleading. Although, the best of the
class (benchmark) can be a valid reference for its peers within the same class,
its status might not be preserved if the analysis is projected outside the
borders of the class. Indeed, the likelihood for outperformance is high. In
order to set targets for global competition, decision makers ought to look at
the concept of performance from a broader geographical perspective, instead of
confining it to a local scope. Here, we analyze, through a case study, SMEs
performance within local and global production technology frameworks and we
highlight the impact of the economy scope on various decisions. Data
envelopment analysis (DEA) is used as a mathematical tool to support such
decisions.
