Exploring smart phone improvements based on a hybrid MCDM model

In recent years, the smart phone equipped with advanced mobile applications such as convenient and easy access to the Internet has become an essential tool for the multitasking era, recently termed the M-era. How we can understand customers' needs and gaps and subsequently satisfy these needs and lessen these gaps by creating a high value-added product to enhance customer satisfaction and increase the benefits to, and the competitive advantage of, enterprises? This study proposes a smart phone improvement for promoting the product value to satisfy the customers' needs with a hybrid MCDM model, which combines the DANP (DEMATEL-based ANP) and VIKOR. The DANP can establish an influential network relation map (INRM) to analyze interrelationship among dimensions/criteria by using the DEMATEL technique and then can measure the influential weights by combining the basic concept of the ANP. Furthermore, the VIKOR combining the influential weights in each criterion can integrate into each dimensional and overall evaluation based on the INRM to improve the gaps for achieving aspiration level and can enhance their competitive advantage in the smart phone market by lessening the gaps related to mobile convenience, thus creating a high value-added mobile phone product. (C) 2014 Published by Elsevier Ltd.