DEA OF FINANCIAL-STATEMENTS DATA - THE UNITED-STATES COMPUTER INDUSTRY

DEA (data envelopment analysis) is a technique for determining the eff iciency frontier (the envelope) to the inputs and outputs of a collect ion of individual corporations or other productive units. DEA is here employed to estimate the intertemporal productive efficiency of U.S. c omputer manufacturers, using financial data brought from earnings stat ements and balance sheets. The results indicate that a few corporation s, including Apple Computer Inc., Compaq Computer Corp., and Seagate T echnology were able to stay at the productivity efficiency frontier th roughout the time period investigated. But not all successful corporat ions did; sometimes subefficiency (=disequilibrium) actually goes toge ther with very rapid growth. A new Malmquist type productivity index i s calculated for each corporation, measuring shifts of the estimated i ntertemporal efficiency frontier.