| Article ID: | iaor20003213 |
| Country: | United States |
| Volume: | 44 |
| Issue: | 4 |
| Start Page Number: | 533 |
| End Page Number: | 542 |
| Publication Date: | Jul 1996 |
| Journal: | Operations Research |
| Authors: | Thompson R.G., Thrall R.M., Dharmapala P.S., Gatewood E.J., Macy S. |
| Keywords: | small businesses |
The University of Houston (UH) Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs) were analysed by Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and Assurance Region (AR) methods. The DEA/AR analyses were made for 11 decision-making units (DMUs) in 1990 and 1991 and for 13 DMUs in 1992. The DEA ratio method was applied to Model I in all three years; unique optimal solutions to the DEA-inefficient DMUs were verified. Also, autoregressions were applied to eliminate some DEA-efficient DMUs requiring unreasonable multipliers to maximise efficiency. In addition, measures of returns-to-scale (RTS) intervals from application of the DEA convex method in 1992 showed several additional DEA-efficient DMUs needed some additional funds to work toward the most productive scale size.