DEA-type models for designing optimal systems and determining optimal budgets

This study intends to develop easy-to-implement and effective approaches to help decision makers cope with the challenges of designing their optimal systems, and determine the corresponding optimal budgets. The approaches are realized by constructing optimal system design (OSD) data envelopment analysis (DEA) models that build on the concepts and techniques of DEA, de novo programming and parametric linear programming with a parametric right-hand side. The proposed models explicitly take the important issue of congestion in systemdesign into account. Therefore, the OSDDEAmodels can help decision makers not only optimally design their systems, but also determine their optimal budgets. Numerical examples are used to evaluate the strengths of the proposed models. © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.