This dissertation brings together the areas of safety science and operations management through a mixed-methods approach to investigate the complex relationships between two, often conflicting, organizational goals - efficiency and safety, in sociotechnical systems (STSs). This research mainly focuses on production pressure (PrP) which is considered as one of the main negative outcomes of overprioritizing the efficiency aspect of STSs. This work seeks to introduce novel methodologies for assessing PrP in real time for the purpose of mitigating its risks and unwanted consequences, particularly in safety critical environments such as traffic control centers (TCCs). Essay 1 concentrates on the theoretical underpinnings of PrP by systematically reviewing the existing literature to clarify and unify the concept under the context of safety science. It identifies key factors contributing to PrP, its negative effects on safety performance in various industries, and potential mitigation strategies. By doing so, this essay contributes to the field through laying the groundwork for more effective management strategies to improve workplace safety. Essay 2 addresses a significant gap identified in Essay 1 by developing a methodology based on Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) for the ongoing measurement and monitoring of PrP. This innovative approach introduces a quantitative mechanism that juxtaposes efficiency and safety related outcomes of hourly performance in safety critical environments. This proposed method allows for a detailed analysis of performance dynamics within STSs. The practical application of this model is demonstrated through its implementation in the infrastructure management system of INFRABEL, the Belgian National Railroad Company. Essay 3 advances the conversation by tackling the predictive limitations of the DEA model established in Essay 2. It integrates Machine Learning (ML) techniques with DEA to develop an innovative method for forecasting near-future PrP levels for proactive management of safety risks. The major contribution of Essay 3 is the novel interface between ML and DEA that can improve decision-making capabilities of managers in safety-critical STSs through real-time monitoring and predictive analytics. Together, these studies contribute to the theoretical discussions around PrP and present practical solutions to longstanding challenges in safety science and operational management. / Doctor of Philosophy / In today's increasingly complex world, the systems that run our industries, from traffic control to healthcare, face a dilemmatic balance between pushing for higher productivity and ensuring safety. This dissertation explores the trade-offs between efficiency and safety which has become more pronounced with the advancement of technology. Traditional safety approaches which used to be effective in simpler systems, struggle in modern STSs where causes and effects are not linear but tangled in a web of unpredictable interactions. Production pressure (PrP), at the core of the mentioned balance, is the drive to maximize output and efficiency, often at the expense of safety. This pressure can lead to unintended and sometimes catastrophic outcomes in the long term, especially in environments where safety is critical, such as rail traffic control centers. Despite its vital impact, there has been a noticeable gap in understanding and managing PrP. In fact, existing safety frameworks are struggling to capture the dynamic nature of PrP, consequently, its real-time measurement and control remain difficult to achieve. This work, therefore, tries to broaden our understanding of PrP and to develop methods to monitor, measure, and predict it, to equip managers and policymakers with the tools to navigate the efficiency-safety dichotomy more effectively. Through a series of essays, this dissertation reviews the current state of knowledge on PrP to identify its sources and impacts and also innovates a novel approach to quantify PrP in real-time and predict its future trends.

U.S. higher education is an example of a large multi-organizational system within the service sector. Its performance regarding workforce development can be analyzed through the lens of industrial and systems engineering. In this three-essay dissertation, we seek the answer to the following question: How can the U.S. higher education system achieve an equal representation of female and minority members in its student and faculty populations? In essay 1, we model the education pipeline with a focus on the system's gender composition from k-12 to graduate school. We use a system dynamics approach to present a systems view of the mechanisms that affect the dynamics of higher education, replicate historical enrollment data, and forecast future trends of higher education's gender composition. Our results indicate that, in the next two decades, women will be the majority of advanced degree holders. In essay 2, we look at the support mechanisms for new-parent, tenure-track faculty in universities with a specific focus on tenure-clock extension policies. We construct a unique data set to answer questions around the effectiveness of removing the stigma connected with automatic tenure-clock policies. Our results show that such policies are successful in removing the stigma and that, overall, faculty members that have newborns and are employed by universities that adopt auto-TCE policies stay one year longer in their positions than other faculty members. In addition, although faculty employed at universities that adopt such policies are generally more satisfied with their jobs, there is no statistically significant effect of auto TCE policies on the chances of obtaining tenure. In essay 3, we focus on the effectiveness of training underrepresented minorities (e.g., African Americans and Hispanics) in U.S. higher education institutions using a Data Envelopment Analysis approach. Our results indicate that graduation rates, average GPAs, and post-graduate salaries of minority students are higher in selective universities and those located in more diverse towns/cities. Furthermore, the graduation rate of minority students in private universities and those with affirmative action programs is higher than in other institutions. Overall, this dissertation provides new insights into improving diversity within the science workforce at different organizational levels by using industrial and systems engineering and management sciences methods. / Ph. D. / One of the goals of higher education institutions is to increase diversity within student and faculty bodies. Equal inclusion of all individuals in students and faculty populations is important to society in several ways. First, providing an equal chance for individuals’ higher education and employment, regardless of demographic characteristics, is a cornerstone of any democratic society. Second, improving educational system diversity leads to higher educational achievements, as overall diversity of U.S. universities is a key indicator of global excellence. Despite improvement over the last decades, we still do not see an equitable distribution of women and racial minorities in such populations. The disparities in minority representation are even greater at higher levels of education and academic employment, such as graduate school and tenure-track positions. In this dissertation, our focus is on the trends, processes, and performance of the U.S. higher education system as it relates to diversity. We apply innovative industrial, systems engineering, and management sciences methods to the subject of diversity in the higher education context. The goal is to investigate answers to the following question: How can the U.S. higher education system achieve equal representation of female and minority groups in its student and faculty populations? The results of this dissertation could be used to train policy makers at institution and state levels on the ways of transforming universities into better places for females and minority groups. In particular, the system dynamics model could be used as a flight simulator in performing policy tests for educational workshops. Moreover, the outcomes could inform individuals and policy makers about the barriers doctorate holders face in following a successful academic path. Finally, this dissertation could be used in system dynamics and Data Envelopment Analysis classes as both case study and teaching materials.

Yes / Prediction of corporate failure is one of the major activities in auditing firms risks and uncertainties. The design of reliable models to predict bankruptcy is crucial for many decision making processes. Although a large number of models have been designed to predict bankruptcy, the relative performance evaluation of competing prediction models remains an exercise that is unidimensional in nature, which often leads to reporting conflicting results. In this research, we overcome this methodological issue by proposing an orientation-free super-efficiency data envelopment analysis model as a multi-criteria assessment framework. Furthermore, we perform an exhaustive comparative analysis of the most popular bankruptcy modeling frameworks for UK data including our own models. In addition, we address two important research questions; namely, do some modeling frameworks perform better than others by design? and to what extent the choice and/or the design of explanatory variables and their nature affect the performance of modeling frameworks?, and report on our findings.

Yes / Although many modelling and prediction frameworks for corporate bankruptcy and distress have been proposed, the relative performance evaluation of prediction models is criticised due to the assessment exercise using a single measure of one criterion at a time, which leads to reporting conflicting results. Mousavi et al. (Int Rev Financ Anal 42:64–75, 2015) proposed an orientation-free super-efficiency DEA-based framework to overcome this methodological issue. However, within a super-efficiency DEA framework, the reference benchmark changes from one prediction model evaluation to another, which in some contexts might be viewed as “unfair” benchmarking. In this paper, we overcome this issue by proposing a slacks-based context-dependent DEA (SBM-CDEA) framework to evaluate competing distress prediction models. In addition, we propose a hybrid crossbenchmarking- cross-efficiency framework as an alternative methodology for ranking DMUs that are heterogeneous. Furthermore, using data on UK firms listed on London Stock Exchange, we perform a comprehensive comparative analysis of the most popular corporate distress prediction models; namely, statistical models, under both mono criterion and multiple criteria frameworks considering several performance measures. Also, we propose new statistical models using macroeconomic indicators as drivers of distress.

Yes / On feature selection, as one of the critical steps to develop a distress prediction model (DPM), a variety of expert systems and machine learning approaches have analytically supported developers. Data envel- opment analysis (DEA) has provided this support by estimating the novel feature of managerial efficiency, which has frequently been used in recent two-stage DPMs. As key contributions, this study extends the application of expert system in credit scoring and distress prediction through applying diverse DEA mod- els to compute corporate market efficiency in addition to the prevailing managerial efficiency, and to estimate the decomposed measure of mix efficiency and investigate its contribution compared to Pure Technical Efficiency and Scale Efficiency in the performance of DPMs. Further, this paper provides a com- prehensive comparison between two-stage DPMs through estimating a variety of DEA efficiency measures in the first stage and employing static and dynamic classifiers in the second stage. Based on experimen- tal results, guidelines are provided to help practitioners develop two-stage DPMs; to be more specific, guidelines are provided to assist with the choice of the proper DEA models to use in the first stage, and the choice of the best corporate efficiency measures and classifiers to use in the second stage.

Kleine regionale Flughäfen leiden oft unter begrenzter Nachfrage sodass sie ihre Kosten nicht decken können. Die Frage ist wie solche Flughäfen effizient strukturiert, bewirtschaftet und möglicherweise finanziell unterstützt werden können. Viele solcher Flughäfen werden einzeln betrieben und erhalten direkte lokale oder nationale Subventionen, während andere von den Quersubventionen leben. Die Dissertation befasst sich zuerst mit der Abschätzung der Effizienz von 85 regionalen europäischen Flughäfen (2002-2009) durch Anwendung der „Data Envelopment Analysis“. Die Schätzungen zeigen, dass die potenziellen Einsparungen 50 Prozent und gesteigerten Einnahmemöglichkeiten 25 Prozent betragen. Die Zugehörigkeit zu einem Flughafensystem reduziert die Effizienz um 5 Prozent. Das durchschnittliche Break-Even Passagieraufkommen hat sich im letzten Jahrzehnt mit 464.000 Passagiere mehr als verdoppelt. Die Flughäfen hätten ihre Kosten mit allein 166.000 Passagiere decken können, wären sie effizient betrieben worden. Der zweite Teil beschäftigt sich mit einem Vergleich der Flughäfen von AENA und DHMI (2009-2011). Eine „Russell measure“ der DEA zeigt, dass die Mehrheit der Flughäfen unter zunehmenden Skalenerträge arbeitet. Die Ergebnisse zeigen höhere durchschnittliche Effizienz der spanischen Flughäfen. Aber ein verstärkte privates Engagement steigert die Effizienz in den türkischen Flughäfen. Wir schlagen verschiedene wirtschaftspolitische Optionen vor um die Effizienz zu verbessern, wie zum Beispiel die Dezentralisierung von Flughafen-Management und die Verbesserung des Flughafennetzes durch die Schließung ineffizienter Flughäfen. Im letzten Teil wird eine räumliche Regressionsmethode verwendet um verschiedene Hypothesen zu testen. Die Ergebnisse von subventionierten französischen und norwegischen Flughäfen zeigen eine negative Auswirkung von Subventionen auf Kosteneffizienz der Flughäfen. Darüber hinaus wird die Bedeutung von Skaleneffekten veranschaulicht. / Small and regional airports often have insufficient revenues to cover their costs. The question is how such airports could be efficiently structured, managed and financially supported. Some airports are operated individually and receive direct subsidies from the local and federal governments. Others survive through cross-subsidizations. This dissertation first deals with the efficiency of 85 small regional European airports for the years 2002-2009 by applying a data envelopment analysis. Estimates show the potential savings and revenue opportunities to be 50 percent and 25 percent respectively. Belonging to an airport system reduces efficiency by about 5 percent. The average break-even passenger throughput over the last decade more than doubled to 464 thousand passengers. However airports behaving efficiently could have covered their operational costs with a mere 166 thousand passengers annually. The second part addresses the comparison of airports belonging to AENA and DHMI for the years between 2009 and 2011. The majority of airports operate under increasing returns to scale. A Russell measure of data envelopment analysis is implemented. Results indicate higher average efficiency levels at Spanish airports, but private involvement enhances efficiency at Turkish ones. Certain policy options including a greater decentralization of airport management and the restructuring of the airport network (by closing some inefficient airports) should be considered to increase the airport systems’ efficiency. In the final part of the dissertation, we have studied how the airport specific characteristics drive the unit costs. In order to capture the spatial interdependence of airport costs, a spatial regression methodology is applied. Two separate datasets of subsidized French and Norwegian airports are used to test various hypotheses. The results show a negative effect of subsidies on airport cost efficiency. Furthermore, the significance of scale economies is illustrated.

Submitted by SBI Biblioteca Digital (sbi.bibliotecadigital@puc-campinas.edu.br) on 2018-08-09T11:58:01Z No. of bitstreams: 1 MARIA PAULA MINORIN BABONI.pdf: 3935036 bytes, checksum: 6b16b5f82fcb82f4f4e69e7cfd8367d7 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-09T11:58:02Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 MARIA PAULA MINORIN BABONI.pdf: 3935036 bytes, checksum: 6b16b5f82fcb82f4f4e69e7cfd8367d7 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-07-28 / To maximize basic sanitation benefits, it?s necessary to solve the challenge of conflicting objectives. As the performance depends on the value of the one who evaluates, this research proposes to evaluate the sanitation from the perspective of different stakeholders that have conflicting objectives: the User Population - PU and the Service Provider - PS. In order to verify how the municipalities placed themselves in each perspective and in the joint vision, this research proposed to classify the Services of Water Supply and Sanitary Sewage of the municipalities of the Metropolitan Region of Campinas, from the vision of the PU and the PS, during the years of 2014 and 2015, according to the relations of efficiencies. Data Envelopment Analysis was used to evaluate the efficiencies of the municipalities in the two views, considering the CCR model oriented to Output and the data provided by the SNIS and IMP, and the Malmquist Index in order to evaluate the movement of the municipalities. It was verified that the majority of the municipal policies favored the PS in detriment of better services for the PU. The municipalities that reached the Great Balance were Engenheiro Coelho and Americana in 2014 and 2015 and Cosm?polis in 2015. In addition, the dominant force of advancement towards the PS occurred due to Technological Progress rather than to the improvement of municipal relative efficiency in the period, while the forces advancing towards the PU were results of the progress of the Frontier and relative municipal efficiency. As regards the characterization of the service providers, it was concluded that the Scope is decisive in the view of the stakeholder when compared to the Legal Nature and the Property, since the municipalities operated by the Regional provider were considered efficient in the view of the PS but inefficient in the vision of the PU, obtaining the last positions in the Ranking of the User Population. / A quest?o dos objetivos conflitantes deve ser resolvida para universalizar os servi?os do saneamento, foco estrat?gico do setor. Para tanto, prop?e-se avaliar o desempenho dos sistemas de abastecimento de ?gua e esgotamento sanit?rio da Regi?o Metropolitana de Campinas ? RMC sob a ?tica de stakeholders que t?m objetivos conflitantes: a Popula??o Usu?ria ? PU e o Prestador de Servi?os ? PS. Os servi?os de ?gua e esgoto foram classificados a partir da vis?o da PU e do PS durante os anos de 2014 e 2015, segundo suas rela??es de efici?ncia, para verificar como os munic?pios colocavam-se em cada perspectiva e na vis?o conjunta. Utilizaram-se a An?lise Envolt?ria de Dados ? DEA para avaliar a efici?ncia municipal, considerando o modelo CCR orientado para Sa?da e os dados p?blicos disponibilizados pelo Sistema Nacional de Informa??es sobre Saneamento ? SNIS e pelo produto Informa??es dos Munic?pios Paulistas ? IMP da Funda??o Sistema Estadual da An?lise de Dados - SEADE, e o ?ndice de Malmquist ? IM para avaliar o comportamento dos munic?pios no per?odo. Verificou-se que a maioria das pol?ticas municipais privilegiavam o PS em detrimento de melhores servi?os para a PU nos dois anos e que os munic?pios que atingiram o Equil?brio ?timo foram Engenheiro Coelho e Americana, em 2014 e 2015, e Cosm?polis em 2014. No sentido do PS, o avan?o ocorreu devido ao Deslocamento da Fronteira ? EFC e o retrocesso de Cosm?polis e Santo Ant?nio de Posse ocorreu devido ao Emparelhamento ? TEC. No sentido da PU, o avan?o ocorreu tanto por causa do TEC quanto do EFC. O retrocesso de Holambra ocorreu tanto por conta do TEC quanto do EFC. A Abrang?ncia do prestador de servi?o, se comparada ? Natureza Jur?dica e ao Direito, foi decisiva na vis?o do stakeholder, j? que os munic?pios operados pelo prestador regional foram ineficientes para a PU e eficientes para o PS, em 2014 e 2015.

The intense economic growth that Brazil has experienced in recent decades and its consequent explosive motorization process have resulted in an undesirable impact: the continuously increasing trend in traffic fatality numbers. This study presents a research on indicators and indexes with the objective of delivering both overall and disaggregated evidence about the road safety performance and targets in fatality reduction in Brazil at the state level taking the exposure into account. The intention is to support road safety strategic analysis in the country and to contribute to improve this critical scene. The methodological structure of this thesis consists of the following three main parts: (I) diagnosing the road safety situation at the state level using final outcome related information, in particular traffic fatality risk data; (II) setting a target number of traffic fatalities based on the relationship between the exposure level and the number of traffic fatalities in each state; and (III) suggesting domains for improvements based on the research of safety performance indicators representing three domains (road user, environment and vehicle) throughout the states. From a benchmarking point of view, we divided the Brazilian states into three separate clusters in order to provide more realistic state performance comparisons. After a data collection and indicators selection step, Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) was the method used for executing the different steps, with the application of four different types of models specially developed for the identified research purposes. In addition, by means of bootstrapping the DEA scores we measured the sensitivity of the results to possible variations in the input data, for example concerning data quality and availability. As a result, we provided a road safety diagnosis per state as well as traffic fatality targets according to different perspectives: the entire group of road users (motorized and nonmotorized ones), motor vehicle occupants, and finally a disaggregated performance evaluation by running four separate DEA models (for motorcycle, car, truck and bus). Moreover, the SPI research including a hierarchy of 27 safety performance indicators expressed the states relative performance on the main road safety domains. Lastly, state profiles compiling all this information summarized the \"per state\" findings. / O intenso crescimento econômico que o Brasil tem experimentado nas últimas décadas e seu consequente explosivo processo de motorização resultaram em um impacto indesejado: a tendência contínua do aumento do número de mortes no trânsito. Este estudo apresenta uma pesquisa acerca de índices e indicadores com o objetivo de fornecer evidências gerais e desagregadas sobre o desempenho da segurança viária e metas de redução no número de mortes no Brasil no âmbito estadual, levando a exposição em consideração. A intenção é embasar uma análise estratégica da segurança viária no país e contribuir para melhorar este cenário crítico. A estrutura metodológica desta tese consiste das seguintes três partes principais: (I) diagnóstico da situação da segurança viária no nível estadual utilizando informações relacionadas ao resultado final, em particular dados de risco de morte no trânsito; (II) estabelecer uma meta para o número de mortes no trânsito para cada estado; e (III) sugerir domínios para melhorias baseado em pesquisa de indicadores de desempenho da segurança viária voltada a três domínios (usuário da via, ambiente e veículo). Sob a ótica do benchmarking, dividiram-se os estados brasileiros em três clusters para proporcionar comparações mais realistas dos desempenhos estaduais. Após uma etapa de coleta e seleção de indicadores, utilizou-se o método de Data Envelopment Analyis (DEA) para executar as diferentes etapas, com a aplicação de quatro tipos distintos de modelos especialmente desenvolvidos para os propósitos da pesquisa. Além disso, por meio de bootstrapping dos escores obtidos com a DEA, mediu-se a sensibilidade dos resultados a possíveis variações nos dados de entrada, no que diz respeito a, por exemplo, qualidade e disponibilidade dos dados. Como resultado, propicia-se, a partir de diferentes perspectivas, um diagnóstico da segurança viária por estado, assim como metas no número de mortes: para todo o grupo de usuários (motorizados e não-motorizados), ocupantes de veículos motorizados, e finalmente uma avaliação desagregada por meio de quatro modelos separados (para motocicletas, automóveis, caminhões e ônibus). Adicionalmente, a pesquisa de indicadores de desempenho da segurança considerando a hierarquia de 27 indicadores expressou os desempenhos relativos dos estados nos principais domínios da segurança viária. Por fim, perfis estaduais compilando todas estas informações resumem os resultados para os estados.

The intense economic growth that Brazil has experienced in recent decades and its consequent explosive motorization process have resulted in an undesirable impact: the continuously increasing trend in traffic fatality numbers. This study presents a research on indicators and indexes with the objective of delivering both overall and disaggregated evidence about the road safety performance and targets in fatality reduction in Brazil at the state level taking the exposure into account. The intention is to support road safety strategic analysis in the country and to contribute to improve this critical scene. The methodological structure of this thesis consists of the following three main parts: (I) diagnosing the road safety situation at the state level using final outcome related information, in particular traffic fatality risk data; (II) setting a target number of traffic fatalities based on the relationship between the exposure level and the number of traffic fatalities in each state; and (III) suggesting domains for improvements based on the research of safety performance indicators representing three domains (road user, environment and vehicle) throughout the states. From a benchmarking point of view, we divided the Brazilian states into three separate clusters in order to provide more realistic state performance comparisons. After a data collection and indicators selection step, Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) was the method used for executing the different steps, with the application of four different types of models specially developed for the identified research purposes. In addition, by means of bootstrapping the DEA scores we measured the sensitivity of the results to possible variations in the input data, for example concerning data quality and availability. As a result, we provided a road safety diagnosis per state as well as traffic fatality targets according to different perspectives: the entire group of road users (motorized and nonmotorized ones), motor vehicle occupants, and finally a disaggregated performance evaluation by running four separate DEA models (for motorcycle, car, truck and bus). Moreover, the SPI research including a hierarchy of 27 safety performance indicators expressed the states relative performance on the main road safety domains. Lastly, state profiles compiling all this information summarized the \"per state\" findings. / O intenso crescimento econômico que o Brasil tem experimentado nas últimas décadas e seu consequente explosivo processo de motorização resultaram em um impacto indesejado: a tendência contínua do aumento do número de mortes no trânsito. Este estudo apresenta uma pesquisa acerca de índices e indicadores com o objetivo de fornecer evidências gerais e desagregadas sobre o desempenho da segurança viária e metas de redução no número de mortes no Brasil no âmbito estadual, levando a exposição em consideração. A intenção é embasar uma análise estratégica da segurança viária no país e contribuir para melhorar este cenário crítico. A estrutura metodológica desta tese consiste das seguintes três partes principais: (I) diagnóstico da situação da segurança viária no nível estadual utilizando informações relacionadas ao resultado final, em particular dados de risco de morte no trânsito; (II) estabelecer uma meta para o número de mortes no trânsito para cada estado; e (III) sugerir domínios para melhorias baseado em pesquisa de indicadores de desempenho da segurança viária voltada a três domínios (usuário da via, ambiente e veículo). Sob a ótica do benchmarking, dividiram-se os estados brasileiros em três clusters para proporcionar comparações mais realistas dos desempenhos estaduais. Após uma etapa de coleta e seleção de indicadores, utilizou-se o método de Data Envelopment Analyis (DEA) para executar as diferentes etapas, com a aplicação de quatro tipos distintos de modelos especialmente desenvolvidos para os propósitos da pesquisa. Além disso, por meio de bootstrapping dos escores obtidos com a DEA, mediu-se a sensibilidade dos resultados a possíveis variações nos dados de entrada, no que diz respeito a, por exemplo, qualidade e disponibilidade dos dados. Como resultado, propicia-se, a partir de diferentes perspectivas, um diagnóstico da segurança viária por estado, assim como metas no número de mortes: para todo o grupo de usuários (motorizados e não-motorizados), ocupantes de veículos motorizados, e finalmente uma avaliação desagregada por meio de quatro modelos separados (para motocicletas, automóveis, caminhões e ônibus). Adicionalmente, a pesquisa de indicadores de desempenho da segurança considerando a hierarquia de 27 indicadores expressou os desempenhos relativos dos estados nos principais domínios da segurança viária. Por fim, perfis estaduais compilando todas estas informações resumem os resultados para os estados.

Com o aumento da capacidade de processamento de dados dentro das empresas de todos os portes e da disponibilidade de informações cada vez maior nos tempos atuais, o uso de indicadores e ferramentas de análise quantitativa tornam-se cada vez mais comuns nas mais diversas áreas, buscando-se eficiência, uma correta alocação de recursos e na geração de expectativas mais realistas de vendas e resultados. Enquanto muitos mercados apresentam uma variedade de dados e de estudos para serem usados como bases de referência, existem outros que ainda são carentes de informações básicas para planejamento e análise. O mercado de materiais cirúrgicos é um destes, onde não estão disponíveis as demandas dos clientes, as projeções de mercado ou as estimativas de market share. Este estudo busca, através da análise das vendas em 43 territórios de empresas de dispositivos médicos com atuação no Brasil nas áreas de ortopedia traumatologia, neurocirurgia e buco-maxilo-facial, aplicar a técnica de Análise Envoltória de Dados (DEA, do inglês “Data Envelopment Analysis”) como um modelo de análise comparativa de eficiência que possa auxiliar nos processos de tomada de decisão, mesmo com uma base restrita e limitada de informações. A aplicação da técnica de DEA apresenta resultados que permitem [1] destacar os pontos de melhoria para os territórios ineficientes buscando [2] homogeneizar a eficiência de atendimento por meio do [3] benchmarking entre as regiões buscando [4] uma maior competitividade neste mercado. / With the increased capacity of data processing within companies of all sizes and the currently availability of all sort of informations, the use of indicators and tools for quantitative analysis become increasingly common in many areas, allowing companies to achieve better efficiency, proper resources allocation, and the settle of more realistic performance expectations. While many markets feature a variety of data and studies, others are deprived of basic information for planning and analysis. Among these, the medical devices market have almost unavailable informations of customers demands, markets forecasts or estimated market share at a regional level. Through the analysis of 43 sales territories of medical devices companies in Brazil, this study uses the technique of data envelopment analysis (DEA) as a model for comparative efficiency analysis that can assist the processes of decision making, even with a restricted and limited database. The application of DEA technique provide results that [1] highlight the points of improvement for inefficient territories [2] in order to homogenize the efficiency of regions through [3] benchmarking between them, [4] to improve overall competitive level.