INTEGRATED ASSESSMENT OF THE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT OF RAILWAY ROLLING STOCK MANUFACTURING AND REPAIR ENTERPRISES: A WEAKEST-LINK-SENSITIVE AGGREGATION APPROACH

Abstract

This paper examines the challenge of aggregating heterogeneous indicators into a single composite measure of the economic development of railway rolling stock manufacturing and overhaul enterprises. The study demonstrates that conventional linear composite indices may insufficiently reflect structural imbalances characteristic of such enterprises, including dependence on a single major customer, limited production localization, and relatively low financial autonomy. This limitation arises because the additive aggregation approach allows strong performance in one dimension to compensate fully for weak performance in another. To address this methodological issue, a weakest-linksensitive aggregation function is proposed, combining the geometric mean of criterion-specific desirability values with their minimum value. The mathematical properties of the proposed function are compared with those of alternative aggregation methods, and a growth-to-quality conversion coefficient is introduced. The proposed approach is illustrated using synthetic data representing four hypothetical enterprises. Sensitivity analysis indicates that the resulting enterprise ranking remains stable when the weakest-link weight varies between 0.2 and 0.8. The findings provide a methodological basis for a more balanced assessment of enterprise economic development, with particular attention to structural constraints and the consistency of performance across evaluation criteria.