Serrano Cinca, C.; Fuertes Callén, Y. and Mar Molinero, C. (2005): "Measuring DEA Efficiency in Internet companies", Decision Support Systems, Ed Elsevier Science, Vol. 38, No 4, pp 557-573

Abstract This paper uses Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), a non-parametric approach to the estimation of production functions, in order to assess efficiency in dot com firms. These firms have two objectives: to make an impact in the Internet and to obtain revenues from their activities. For this reason, the outputs have been two: unique visitors—a web metric—and revenues. DEA efficiencies have been obtained under various input/output combinations. A ranking of dot com firms in terms of relative efficiency has been obtained. A method based on multivariate analysis has been proven to be successful at showing the strengths and weaknesses of individual dot com firms. It is shown that there is a relationship between the type of e-business (e-tailers, search/portal, content/communities), and the way in which efficiency is obtained. The paper suggests a new approach to the problem of deciding which inputs and outputs the model should contain. Keywords Efficiency; E-business; Dot com; Principal components analysis; Data Envelopment Analysis; Inputs/outputs selection; Web metrics Download (http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.dss.2003.08.004)