Abstract:

According to the multi-layer structural feature of mobile network, Slacks-based Measure (SBM) Model of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) technique is applied to build the efficiency measurement to evaluate the integrated utilization of mobile network, and then, based on the industrial dataset of 31 provinces in China during 2003-2010, mobile network efficiency and utilization of each network capacity are evaluated, and efficiency growth is also evaluated by using the Malmquist index; next, all these indexes’ differences among the eastern, western and central regions in economic view and the northern and southern regions in operational view are investigated; the results reveal that, the loss of efficiency is mainly caused by the low utilization of the base station and SMS switch, and the huge network investment distributed to eastern provinces and 10 northern provinces after the launch of 3G is another significant cause for the loss of efficiency in relevant regions; hence, the government is required to intensively carry out the different regional co-construction and sharing policy in the era of large-scale construction of 3G network

Key words: network efficiency, data envelopment analysis, slacks-based measure, Malmquist index, mobile communication