Summary: | 碩士 === 國防管理學院 === 資源管理研究所 === 89 === Privatizing public enterprises has been a worldwide issue as well as one of our country’s economic goals. In the past, our public enterprises underwent rapid privatization by releasing stocks without any appropriate choice mechanism or relevant studies. The privatization of military factories is part of our country’s economic construction and also a main issue of national defense. It is the premise on which privatization plans for military factories are implemented.
For a long time, military factories has been led by defense policies and operated with defense budget without any outside competition. They have the same weakness such as high operating cost and low efficiency like other public enterprises. The Ministry of National Defense expected to enhance military factories’ operating performance and to promote the development of relevant private industries by authorizing private businesses to operate military factories. However, this privatization plan had to be suspended at early experimental stage after encountering some problems. The MND ignored the fact that there were different types of military factories and tried to privatize all of them by the same way. This approach has been much criticized. This study aims to build a choice mechanism to help military factories find the most suitable privatization method according to their own characteristics and various privatization elements. This choice mechanism is based on a decision making process and strengthened by interviewing many experts. We hope it works not only for military factories but also for other public enterprises.
Military factories are classified into regular, in-between, exclusive, and mixed types according to their products. The characteristics of each type are defined by using two criteria i.e., “the extent to affect national security” and “the level of dual use.” We have listed 5 privatization methods and 3 non-privatization methods. “The ability to continue former work,” “service quality,” and “the reliability of fulfilling missions” are categorized as primary elements. While “the requirement of legislation,” “the impact on employees,” “production efficiency,” “the level of saving defense budget,” “the extent to solve the problem of aging employees,” and “the flexibility of organization and work” are listed as secondary elements in selecting privatization methods. The decision making process includes “setting up goals,” “listing possible alternatives,” “specifying ranking criteria,” “determining the criteria of selecting”, “constructing selecting procedures” and “determining the most suitable method”. The findings of this study are as follows:
1.Regular factories: The most suitable privatization methods in priority sequence are─
(1) Contracting out part of the products to private companies.
(2) Operated by companies set up by the employees.
(3) Operated jointly by the military and private companies.
(4) Contracting out the whole operation to private business.
(5) Closing the factories and transfer the operation to private business.
2.In-between factories: The most suitable privatization methods in priority sequence are─
(1) Contracting out part of the products to private companies.
(2) Operated by companies set up by the employees.
(3) Operated jointly by the military and private companies.
3.Exclusive factories: There is no suitable privatization method for this type of factories. Besides, all of them are weapons factories under the CFS and have adopted the “Operating Fund System”. As a result, the most practical method for these factories is to maintain the status quo. The second best choice is to be operated by the government instead.
4.Mixed factories:
(1) The regular part: The most suitable privatization methods in priority sequence are─
(A) Contracting out part of the products to private companies.
(B) Operated by companies set up by the employees.
(C) Operated jointly by the military and private companies.
(2) The exclusive part: There is no privatization method for this type of factories. In fact, there is only one mixed-type factory i.e. Chung-shan Institute of Science and Technology. It is financed mostly by defense budget and only a small portion of its spending are supported by “Dual Technology Development Fund.” As a result, the most practical method for the Institute is to maintain the status quo and improve its management. The second best choice is to be operated by the government instead.
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