An integrated fuzzy analytical network process for prioritisation of new technology-based firms in Iran

The performance evaluation and prioritisation of knowledge-based firms which are working in science and technology parks enable the decision makers (DMs) to specify the benchmarks (the best firms) and grant them or help other firms to improve their performance. In this paper, the performance of new technology-based firms (NTBFs) in Iran is evaluated through a multi-criteria decision-making method. To do so, at the first the most important criteria to assess the performance of the NTBFs are proposed according to the literature and experts' opinions. Then, due to complex relationship and correlation among these criteria, an integrated fuzzy analytic network process (ANP) is proposed to evaluate NTBFs under uncertainty of evaluation parameters. The results show that the applied approach is a suitable tool for prioritisation of NTBFs. © 2019 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.. All rights reserved.