ABSTRACT

New building demands of the shipyards in the shipbuilding industry alter subject to several national and international factors. These factors are based on many different reasons, in particular economic, political, strategic and social reasons. The global economic crisis has affected Turkish shipyards, especially in recent years. A drop in orders and thus production quantities has jeopardized the shipbuilding industry. In this context, the selection of the Project (ship type) to be built in the shipyard is highly significant to ensure an accurate and profitable investment.

Interviews with Decision Makers composed of senior managers working in the shipbuilding industry have contributed to this study. A selection of ship types that will be built in a Turkish shipyard by using TOPSIS and VIKOR methods in the scope of fuzzy logic has been investigated in order to designate the selection criteria and selection decision. For this purpose, ships to be built, which have been determined as a result of the interviews with the designated Decision Makers, have been classified as a ship type according to their technical particulars and purpose. Criteria and ship types expressed as alternatives have been evaluated respectively with the assistance of linguistic expressions by Decision Makers. Afterwards, the numerical analysis of these evaluation has been completed by using triangular fuzzy numbers with TOPSIS and VIKOR methods and the obtained results were compared.