Ranking of Suppliers for a Steel Industry: A Comparison of the Original TODIM and the Choquet-extended TODIM Methods

This paper presents an application of both the originalTODIM and the Choquet-extended TODIM methods. Both approaches are used here in order to rank suppliers of specified materials and goods quite relevant for a steel industry located in the Brazilian state of Rio de Janeiro. One conceptual advantage from using the Choquet-extended TODIM method is that it can deal with interactions between evaluation criteria. Results from the application of these two methods practically lead to the same ranks. The non-parametric statistic sign test allows concluding that that both methods are indeed equivalent in terms of the final results for this particular application. As a conclusion it can be saidthat the importance of a formal procedure for ranking suppliers basically consists of contributing to greater clarity and a higher learning throughout the ranking process.