Can a decision problem have more than one dependent variable?Can a model have more than one dependent variable?What is the difference between a spreadsheet model and a computer model?If you were presented with several different models (descriptive model, predictive model and prescriptive model) of a given decision problem, which would you be most inclined to use? Why?

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Can a decision problem have more than one dependent variable?

Practical Management Science

6th Edition

ISBN:9781337406659

Author:WINSTON, Wayne L.

Publisher:WINSTON, Wayne L.

Chapter10: Introduction To Simulation Modeling

Section: Chapter Questions

Problem 49P

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The model in Example 9.3 has only two market outcomes, good and bad, and two corresponding predictions, good and bad. Modify the decision tree by allowing three outcomes and three predictions: good, fair, and bad. You can change the inputs to the model (monetary values and probabilities) in any reasonable way you like. Then you will also have to modify the Bayes rule calculations. You can decide whether it is easier to modify the existing tree or start from scratch with a new tree.
An automobile manufacturer is considering whether to introduce a new model called the Racer. The profitability of the Racer depends on the following factors: The fixed cost of developing the Racer is triangularly distributed with parameters 3, 4, and 5, all in billions. Year 1 sales are normally distributed with mean 200,000 and standard deviation 50,000. Year 2 sales are normally distributed with mean equal to actual year 1 sales and standard deviation 50,000. Year 3 sales are normally distributed with mean equal to actual year 2 sales and standard deviation 50,000. The selling price in year 1 is 25,000. The year 2 selling price will be 1.05[year 1 price + 50 (% diff1)] where % diff1 is the number of percentage points by which actual year 1 sales differ from expected year 1 sales. The 1.05 factor accounts for inflation. For example, if the year 1 sales figure is 180,000, which is 10 percentage points below the expected year 1 sales, then the year 2 price will be 1.05[25,000 + 50( 10)] = 25,725. Similarly, the year 3 price will be 1.05[year 2 price + 50(% diff2)] where % diff2 is the percentage by which actual year 2 sales differ from expected year 2 sales. The variable cost in year 1 is triangularly distributed with parameters 10,000, 12,000, and 15,000, and it is assumed to increase by 5% each year. Your goal is to estimate the NPV of the new car during its first three years. Assume that the company is able to produce exactly as many cars as it can sell. Also, assume that cash flows are discounted at 10%. Simulate 1000 trials to estimate the mean and standard deviation of the NPV for the first three years of sales. Also, determine an interval such that you are 95% certain that the NPV of the Racer during its first three years of operation will be within this interval.
The eTech Company is a fairly recent entry in the electronic device area. The company competes with Apple. Samsung, and other well-known companies in the manufacturing and sales of personal handheld devices. Although eTech recognizes that it is a niche player and will likely remain so in the foreseeable future, it is trying to increase its current small market share in this huge competitive market. Jim Simons, VP of Production, and Catherine Dolans, VP of Marketing, have been discussing the possible addition of a new product to the companys current (rather limited) product line. The tentative name for this new product is ePlayerX. Jim and Catherine agree that the ePlayerX, which will feature a sleeker design and more memory, is necessary to compete successfully with the big boys, but they are also worried that the ePlayerX could cannibalize sales of their existing productsand that it could even detract from their bottom line. They must eventually decide how much to spend to develop and manufacture the ePlayerX and how aggressively to market it. Depending on these decisions, they must forecast demand for the ePlayerX, as well as sales for their existing products. They also realize that Apple. Samsung, and the other big players are not standing still. These competitors could introduce their own new products, which could have very negative effects on demand for the ePlayerX. The expected timeline for the ePlayerX is that development will take no more than a year to complete and that the product will be introduced in the market a year from now. Jim and Catherine are aware that there are lots of decisions to make and lots of uncertainties involved, but they need to start somewhere. To this end. Jim and Catherine have decided to base their decisions on a planning horizon of four years, including the development year. They realize that the personal handheld device market is very fluid, with updates to existing products occurring almost continuously. However, they believe they can include such considerations into their cost, revenue, and demand estimates, and that a four-year planning horizon makes sense. In addition, they have identified the following problem parameters. (In this first pass, all distinctions are binary: low-end or high-end, small-effect or large-effect, and so on.) In the absence of cannibalization, the sales of existing eTech products are expected to produce year I net revenues of 10 million, and the forecast of the annual increase in net revenues is 2%. The ePIayerX will be developed as either a low-end or a high-end product, with corresponding fixed development costs (1.5 million or 2.5 million), variable manufacturing costs ( 100 or 200). and selling prices (150 or 300). The fixed development cost is incurred now, at the beginning of year I, and the variable cost and selling price are assumed to remain constant throughout the planning horizon. The new product will be marketed either mildly aggressively or very aggressively, with corresponding costs. The costs of a mildly aggressive marketing campaign are 1.5 million in year 1 and 0.5 million annually in years 2 to 4. For a very aggressive campaign, these costs increase to 3.5 million and 1.5 million, respectively. (These marketing costs are not part of the variable cost mentioned in the previous bullet; they are separate.) Depending on whether the ePlayerX is a low-end or high-end produce the level of the ePlayerXs cannibalization rate of existing eTech products will be either low (10%) or high (20%). Each cannibalization rate affects only sales of existing products in years 2 to 4, not year I sales. For example, if the cannibalization rate is 10%, then sales of existing products in each of years 2 to 4 will be 10% below their projected values without cannibalization. A base case forecast of demand for the ePlayerX is that in its first year on the market, year 2, demand will be for 100,000 units, and then demand will increase by 5% annually in years 3 and 4. This base forecast is based on a low-end version of the ePlayerX and mildly aggressive marketing. It will be adjusted for a high-end will product, aggressive marketing, and competitor behavior. The adjustments with no competing product appear in Table 2.3. The adjustments with a competing product appear in Table 2.4. Each adjustment is to demand for the ePlayerX in each of years 2 to 4. For example, if the adjustment is 10%, then demand in each of years 2 to 4 will be 10% lower than it would have been in the base case. Demand and units sold are the samethat is, eTech will produce exactly what its customers demand so that no inventory or backorders will occur. Table 2.3 Demand Adjustments When No Competing Product Is Introduced Table 2.4 Demand Adjustments When a Competing Product Is Introduced Because Jim and Catherine are approaching the day when they will be sharing their plans with other company executives, they have asked you to prepare an Excel spreadsheet model that will answer the many what-if questions they expect to be asked. Specifically, they have asked you to do the following: You should enter all of the given data in an inputs section with clear labeling and appropriate number formatting. If you believe that any explanations are required, you can enter them in text boxes or cell comments. In this section and in the rest of the model, all monetary values (other than the variable cost and the selling price) should be expressed in millions of dollars, and all demands for the ePlayerX should be expressed in thousands of units. You should have a scenario section that contains a 0/1 variable for each of the binary options discussed here. For example, one of these should be 0 if the low-end product is chosen and it should be 1 if the high-end product is chosen. You should have a parameters section that contains the values of the various parameters listed in the case, depending on the values of the 0/1 variables in the previous bullet For example, the fixed development cost will be 1.5 million or 2.5 million depending on whether the 0/1 variable in the previous bullet is 0 or 1, and this can be calculated with a simple IF formula. You can decide how to implement the IF logic for the various parameters. You should have a cash flows section that calculates the annual cash flows for the four-year period. These cash flows include the net revenues from existing products, the marketing costs for ePlayerX, and the net revenues for sales of ePlayerX (To calculate these latter values, it will help to have a row for annual units sold of ePlayerX.) The cash flows should also include depreciation on the fixed development cost, calculated on a straight-line four-year basis (that is. 25% of the cost in each of the four years). Then, these annual revenues/costs should be summed for each year to get net cash flow before taxes, taxes should be calculated using a 32% tax rate, and taxes should be subtracted and depreciation should be added back in to get net cash flows after taxes. (The point is that depreciation is first subtracted, because it is not taxed, but then it is added back in after taxes have been calculated.) You should calculate the company's NPV for the four-year horizon using a discount rate of 10%. You can assume that the fixed development cost is incurred now. so that it is not discounted, and that all other costs and revenues are incurred at the ends of the respective years. You should accompany all of this with a line chart with three series: annual net revenues from existing products; annual marketing costs for ePlayerX; and annual net revenues from sales of ePlayerX. Once all of this is completed. Jim and Catherine will have a powerful tool for presentation purposes. By adjusting the 0/1 scenario variables, their audience will be able to see immediately, both numerically and graphically, the financial consequences of various scenarios.
You want to take out a 450,000 loan on a 20-year mortgage with end-of-month payments. The annual rate of interest is 3%. Twenty years from now, you will need to make a 50,000 ending balloon payment. Because you expect your income to increase, you want to structure the loan so at the beginning of each year, your monthly payments increase by 2%. a. Determine the amount of each years monthly payment. You should use a lookup table to look up each years monthly payment and to look up the year based on the month (e.g., month 13 is year 2, etc.). b. Suppose payment each month is to be the same, and there is no balloon payment. Show that the monthly payment you can calculate from your spreadsheet matches the value given by the Excel PMT function PMT(0.03/12,240, 450000,0,0).
TRUE OR FALSE * TRUE FALSE The first step of decision making is to identify and define the problem. Decision making begins with the choosing of an alternative, which is the act of making the decision. Single-criterion decision problems are problems that involve more than one criterion. Multicriteria decision problems are problems in which the objective is to find the best solution with respect to one criterion.
Make sure to identify and define the decision variables, and formulate the objective function and constraints for each problem. You may use Excel to solve the mathematical problems. 1. Sunchem, a manufacturer of printing inks, has five manufacturing plants worldwide. Their locations and capacities are shown in Table 1 along with the cost of producing 1 ton of ink at each facility. The major markets for the inks are North America, Europe, Japan, South America, and the rest of Asia. Demand at each market is shown in Table 1. Transportation costs from each plant to each market in U.S. dollars are shown in Table 1. Management must come up with a production plan for the next year. a. If no plant can run below 50 percent capacity, how much should each plant produce and which markets should each plant supply? b. If there are no limits on the minimum amount produced in a plant, how much should each plant produce?
In a nonlinear programming model, for any set of values of the decision variables, whether or not the constraints are satisfied is known with certainty. Is this true or false?
An investor is considering investing in stocks, real estate, or bonds economic conditions. Suppose that the probabilities for good, stable and poor conditions are 0.2, 0.4 and … (figure it out), respectively. Table 1 shows the payoff returns for the investor’s decision situation. Table 1: Investment returns Economic Conditions Investment Good Stable Poor Stocks R5 000 R7 000 R3 000 Real estate -R2 000 R10 000 R6 000 Bonds R4 000 R4 000 R4 000 Assuming the probabilities of the occurrence of the state of nature are unknown, what will be the best investment alternative; a) If the decision maker is pessimistic about the future state, (3) b) If the decision maker strikes a compromise between the maximin and maximax, assuming the coefficient of pessimism is 0.2. (4) c) If the decision is based on opportunistic loss. (6) d) If we use the equally likelihood criterion
In choosing four electives from the dazzling array offered by the Decision Sciences Department next semester, the students that had already taken the management science class were able to craft a model using a multiple-choice constraint. Describe how effective this multiple-choice constraint has on decision making.
Is my solution correct and did I fully answer the questions? (see attachment for my solution) Question: There are three factories on Momiss River. Each emits two types of pollutants, labeled P1 and P2, into the river. If the waste from each factory is processed, the pollution in the river can be reduced. It costs $1,500 to process a ton of factory 1 waste, and each ton processed reduces the amount of P1 by 0.10 ton and the amount of P2 by 0.45 ton. It costs $2,500 to process a ton of factory 2 waste, and each ton processed reduces the amount of P1 by 0.20 ton and the amount of P2 by 0.25 ton. It costs $3,000 to process a ton of factory 3 waste, and each ton processed reduces the amount of P1 by 0.40 ton and the amount of P2 by 0.50 ton. The state wants to reduce the amount of P1 in the river by at least 125 tons and the amount of P2 by at least 175 tons. a. Use Solver to determine how to minimize the cost of reducing pollution by the desired amounts. Are the LP assumptions…
Choose Yes or No to indicate whether each of the following statements about the CONVEXITY OR CONCAVITY of an OBJECTIVE FUNCTION of convex programming problems is true. Objective function may exist and may be concave Objective function may exist and may be convex Objective function may exist and may be neither convex nor concave Objective function may exist and must be concave Objective function may exist and must be convex Objective function may exist and must be neither convex nor concave Objective function must exist and must be concave Objective function must exist and must be convex Objective function must exist and must be neither convex nor…
“Good Intentions” (GI) company produces two products, which it sells on both a cash and credit basis. Revenues from credit sales will not have been received but are included in determining profit earned during the current six-month period. Sales during the next six months can be made either from units produced during the next six months or from the beginning inventory. Relevant information about products one and two is as follows. During the next six months, at most 150 units of product type 1 can be sold on a cash basis, and at most 100 units of product 1 can be sold on a credit basis. It costs £35 to produce each unit of product type 1, and each sells for £40. A credit sale of a unit of product 1 yields £0.50 less profit than a cash sale (because of delays in receiving payment). Two hours of production time are needed to produce each unit of product 1. At the beginning of the six-month period, 60 units of product 1 are in the inventory. During the next six months, at most 175 units…