The performance of major airports in the Europe, North America and Asia

Purpose This study aims to provide a meaningful comparison of airports’ performance and better understand the differences observed in the analysed airport performance by presenting a model to analyse the relationship between operational and financial performance and airport characteristics. Design/methodology/approach This study uses a quantitative analysis approach. The Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) and entropy weight were utilised to analyse 17 airports in three Airports Council International regions: Asia, Europe and North America. Through operational and financial factors, these sample airports identified the most efficiently operated airports from 2016 to 2019. Findings Overall, Asian airports were superior in operational and financial efficiency. Unlike operating performance, the sample airport’s financial and total performance results show a similar trend. There were no noticeable changes in operational factors. Therefore, differences in financial variables for each airport may affect the total performance. Practical implications This study provides insightful implications for airport policymakers to establish a standardised information disclosure foundation for consistent analysis and encourage airports to provide this information. Originality/value The adoption of Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortisation (EBITDA) to debt ratio and EBITDA per passenger, which had previously been underutilised in the previous study as financial factors, demonstrated differences between airports for airport stakeholders. In addition, the study presented a model that facilitates producing more intuitive results using TOPSIS, which was relatively underutilised compared to other methodologies such as date envelopment analysis.