A multi-methodological approach for shipping registry selection in maritime transportation industry

Selecting the most suitable registry alternative for shipping fleets has become a highly complex strategic activity for ship owners in the maritime transportation industry, and necessitates consideration of both internal and external environmental factors, which can be both qualitative and quantitative. The aim of this paper is to propose an originally structured multi-methodological approach based on the systematic application of the SWOT analysis, the AHP and the TOPSIS methods to support the critical decision process on shipping registry selection under multiple criteria. In the proposed approach, the SWOT analysis is utilized to determine the key assessment factors on the shipping registry decision and to structure the decision hierarchy. While the AHP is used to measure the relative importance of evaluation criteria in this decision hierarchy, the TOPSIS is applied to rank the shipping registry alternatives. As a case study, major open registries are analyzed to select the most suitable of them for the fleet that is operated by a worldwide ship owner. The results show that the proposed multi-methodological approach takes the advantages of the SWOT analysis, the AHP and the TOPSIS to select the most suitable shipping registry. The proposed approach also provides a relatively simple and very well suited decision-making tool for this type of strategic decision making problem.