1.

Comparison of sales commission plans1

A company has received two sales commission plans, Plan-A and Plan-B, for selling the
product manufactured by it.
In Plan-A, when the number of units of the product sold is less than 20,000, no sales
commission is to be paid; otherwise, sales commission is to be paid at the rate of Re.1 for
each unit sold beyond 20,000.
In Plan-B also, for sales up to 20,000 units of the product, there is no commission. For sales
between 20,000 and 60,000 units, the commission is at the rate of Re.0.6 for each unit
above 20,000; for sales beyond 60,000 units, the commission is at the rate of Rs.1.5 for
each unit in excess of 60,000.
The company’s variable costs associated with manufacturing of the product are estimated as
follows:

 Raw material cost per unit of final product: Rs.15

 Utilities cost per unit of final product: Rs. 5

The associated fixed costs per year are given as:

Rent = Rs.60,000; Salaries = Rs.2,00,000; Advertising Expenditure = Rs.80,000,

Other Miscellaneous fixed costs = Rs. 20,000

The sales price per unit of the product is Rs.25.

Question:

1. Develop a spread sheet to compare the two sales commission plans. In comparing the two
plans, you are required to find the break-even sales volume for each of the two plans.
You are also required to find the sales volume, if any, at which both the plans yield the
same profit; below this sales volume, one of the plans is more profitable, and above it,
the other plan is better.

2. Suppose the advertising expense is dependent on the sales volume as given below:
Sales Volume (units) Advertising Expenditure (Rs.)
0 – 29,999 5,000
30,000 – 59,999 10,000
60,000 – 79,999 30,000
80,000 – 89,999 60,000
>= 90,000 90,000

Evaluate the two plans as above incorporating the variability of advertising expenses.

1
This note is taken from IIMA/CISG0104TEC Spreadsheet through Examples: Microsoft Excel 2010 Version by
Prof. V. Venkat Rao of IIM Ahmedabad
1
 2. Conference Budget.

Mr. Eradico, a manager of an NGO, proposes to conduct a two-day workshop on

eradication of illiteracy. He has negotiated with a local educational institution for a
conference hall in which the sessions of the conference could be held, and for hostel rooms
in which the delegates could be accommodated. The educational institute agreed to
provide a conference hall for two days, and accommodation for one night for a maximum
of fifty people. A caterer was to to supply breakfast, lunch, on both days, conference
dinner in the evening on the first day, special tea following the inaugural function, normal
tea once in the afternoon on both days, and normal tea once in the morning on the second
day. The information relevant for working out the conference budget is given below:
 The number of delegates will be between twenty and forty.
 Delegates are required to register in advance, along with submission of registration fee.
 The number of people in the organizing team will be ten, including all volunteers.
 There will be four invited speakers from different parts of the country.

The costs of different items are:

 Inaugural tea and snacks: Rs 100 per person. The inauguration is expected to be attended by
the delegates, the organizing team, invited speakers, and about twenty other invitees.
 Lunch: Rs 200 per plate. Lunch is given to all delegates, speakers, and organizers, on both the
days. Normal tea: Rs 50 per person. This is given in the afternoon on the first day, and in the
morning and afternoon on the second day. For this item, speakers, delegates, and organizers
are included.
 Breakfast: Rs 100 per person. Breakfast is given to delegates, speakers, and organizers on
both the days. Conference dinner: Rs 250 per person. This happens in the evening on the first
day. In addition to the delegates, speakers, organizers, fifteen guests would attend the
conference dinner. Dinner is not needed on the second day.
 Rental charge for the conference hall along with audio visual equipment: Rs 10,000 per day.
 Accommodation charges are Rs 1500 per person per night; it is estimated that all delegates
and speakers will arrive in the morning on the inaugural day, and leave by 7.00 PM on the
second day. Hence the delegates and speakers need to be provided accommodation for only
one night.
 Conference kit: Rs 500 per kit. The kit includes a bag, conference material, and some
stationery. The kit is to be provided to the delegates, speakers, and organizers.
 Pickup and drop. Airport/railway station pickup and drop are to be provided to each delegate
and speaker. The estimated charge for pickup is Rs 200 per person, and for drop also Rs 200
per person.
 Return airfare: Each speaker is to be reimbursed return airfare, which is estimated to be Rs
10,000 per each speaker.
 Honorarium: Each speaker is to be given an honorarium of Rs 4,000.
 For administrative expenses like telephone, courier and clerical work, a sum of Rs 40,000 is
to be set apart.
Questions:
1. If the entire expenditure of the conference is to be met by the registration fee alone, then
what should be the registration fee per participant?
2. If a maximum amount of Rs two lakh could be raised through sponsorships, what should
be the registration fee per participant?
3. To answer the above questions, experiment with various possible values of parameters
like number of delegates and sponsorship amount.
4. Can you conclude from your experiments that, in general, the more the participants, the
less the registration fee per participant, for break-even?
2
 3. Analysis of Transportation Costs

The distributor of bulk items needs a tool to compute the transportation costs from the
goods movement data and distance matrix. It is also required to study the impact of
changes in freight tariff on transportation costs. A sample of distance matrix for five major
cities is given below as a lower diagonal matrix:

Distance Matrix (in km)

City Chennai Delhi Hyderabad Kolkata Mumbai

Chennai 0
Delhi 2160 0
Hyderabad 700 1450 0
Kolkata 1680 1440 1520 0
Mumbai 1370 1410 740 2080 0

The typical goods movement data are given in the table below:

Consignment # From City To City Tonnage

1 Mumbai Kolkata 500
2 Mumbai Hyderabad 200
3 Hyderabad Chennai 800
4 Hyderabad Kolkata 200
5 Kolkata Delhi 100
6 Kolkata Chennai 100
7 Delhi Chennai 600
8 Delhi Hyderabad 900
9 Chennai Mumbai 70

Questions
Assuming a basic freight rate of Rs.1.3 per tonne-km, develop a spreadsheet based
solution to interactively workout the following:

Freight charges for each transaction and total charges.

Revised total freight charges, in the form of a table, with increase in the freight
rate say by 5, 7, 10, 12, 15 and 20 per cent.

Re-compute the freight charges with slab based tariff: Rs.2 up to 100,000 tonne-km,
Rs.1.8 for 100,001 -150,000 tonne-km, Rs.1.5 for 150,001 to 250,000 tonne-km,
Rs.1.25 for 250,001 to 500,000 tonne-km, and Rs.1.1 per tonne-km for amount above
500,000 tonne- km.

4. Frequent Flyer Scheme of IA

3
The frequent flyer scheme of Indian Airlines (IA) offers free travel to IA customers for
mileage points earned by them through earlier travels. The cities and mileage points
required to avail a free ticket to those cities are given in the IAFF Mileage Points Table on
the IA website. A segment of the table is rearranged (in the ascending order of points
required) and reproduced in columns A to C (rows 1-14) of the spreadsheet below.

A B C D E F G H
IA Frequent Flyer Mileage Points Table (Ahmedabad Segment)
1

2 Points required for

3 To City Executive Economy Flying Points 12000 ----------
Accrued:
4 Vadodara 2880 1920 Class of Interest: Economy ----------
5 Mumbai 8280 5520 Free travel to city:Delhi ----------

6 Jaipur 9840 6560

7 Delhi 14160 9540 Farthest Possible ----------
City

8 Hyderabad 16290 10860 Balance Pts: ----------

9 Muscat 17600 13000

10 Sharjah 17660 13040
11 Kuwait 20100 14900
12 Bangalore 23220 15480
13 Bhubaneswar 26220 17480
14 Kolkata 35160 23440

The flying points earned by a customer are given in cell G3. Also the class and city to
which the customer is interested to travel using free entitlement is given in cells G4 and G5
respectively. The formulae you develop for the questions below should work with any valid
data entered in these cells.

Questions

Enter a formula in cell H4 to obtain the column number in the table A3:C14 of the class in
cell G4. For example, if the class given in G4 is Economy, the value in H4 should be 3. Use
this result in subsequent questions, to simplify the formulae where ever possible.

Formula:
Enter a formula in cell H5 to obtain one of the text strings “Yes” or “No” depending on
whether the points given in G3 are adequate (Yes) or not adequate (No) to travel by the
class in G4 to the city in G5. For example, with 12000 points, the customer can travel free
by Economy class to the desired city Delhi (required points 9540) and therefore the output
should be Yes for this data. Formula:

4
Enter a formula in cell G7 to obtain the farthest possible city the customer can travel free
with the points accrued (given in G3), by the class given in G4. For example, with 12000
points, the farthest city the customer can travel free by Economy class is Hyderabad.
Formula:

Enter a formula in cell G8 to obtain the balance mileage points; i.e. the difference of points
accrued and points required to travel by the class in G4 to the farthest city obtained in G7.
For example, with 12000 points, after travelling to the farthest city (Hyderabad) in
Economy class, the balance is 1140 (12000- 10860).
Formula:
Extension: Re-develop solutions to the above, if more than two classes are to be
considered.

5
 5. Analysis of Consignment Dispatches

Distances, in kilo meters, between cities are given as a lower diagonal distance table in the range
A3:F8 in the spreadsheet. Data on different consignments dispatched are given in rows 13 through 22.
First three columns of this data are: From city, To city, and Quantity dispatched (in tons).

Questions

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in rows below) in cell D13 to obtain the row
number in the distance table of the ‘From city’ in cell A13.

Formula:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in the rows below) in cell E13 to obtain the
column number in the Distance Table of the ‘To city’ in cell B13.

Formula:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in the rows below) in the cell F13 to obtain the
distance between the ‘From city’ in cell A13 and the ‘To city’ in cell B13. Use row and
column numbers fetched above into D13 and E13 cells and only the lower diagonal
Distance Table. Do not create/use any additional data in the distance table for this
purpose.

Formula:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in rows below) in cell G13 that gives ton-km of
the consignment, by multiplying the quantity despatched (C13) with distance obtained
in cell F13.

Formula:

For each city, it is required to obtain the total ton-km of the consignments sent as well
as received in the range I3:K7. Write a formula in cell J3 (to be copied to the range
J3:K7) that gives the sum of ton-km of consignments sent from the city in cell I3.

Formula:

6
 A B C D E F G H I J K
1 Distance Table (distance in km) Consignment Summary (Ton-km)
2 City Sent Received
3 Ahmedabad 0 Ahmedabad -----
4 Baroda 110 0 Baroda
5 Rajkot 200 270 0 Rajkot
6 Bhavnagar 250 320 175 0 Bhavnagar
7 Surat 270 150 400 470 0 Surat
8 Ahmedabad Baroda Rajkot Bhavnagar Surat
9
10
11 Consignment Data
12 Fromcity Tocity Despatch Fromcity Tocity Distance Tonkm
Qty (tons) row no. col.no. (km)
13 Baroda Rajkot 100 ----- --------- --------- ------
14 Rajkot Bhavnagar 80
15 Bhavnagar Baroda 120
16 Rajkot Surat 100
17 Surat Rajkot 200
18 Ahmedabad Bhavnagar 80
19 Baroda Surat 200
20 Ahmedabad Surat 300
21 Surat Ahmedabad 450
22 Baroda Rajkot 140

7
Questions

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in rows below) in cell D13 to obtain the row
number in the distance table of the ‘From city’ in cell A13.

Formula:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in the rows below) in cell E13 to obtain the
column number in the Distance Table of the ‘To city’ in cell B13.

Formula:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in the rows below) in the cell F13 to obtain the
distance between the ‘From city’ in cell A13 and the ‘To city’ in cell B13. Use row and
column numbers fetched above into D13 and E13 cells and only the lower diagonal
Distance Table. Do not create/use any additional data in the distance table for this
purpose.

Formula:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in rows below) in cell G13 that gives ton-km of
the consignment, by multiplying the quantity despatched (C13) with distance obtained
in cell F13.

Formula:

For each city, it is required to obtain the total ton-km of the consignments sent as well
as received in the range I3:K7. Write a formula in cell J3 (to be copied to the range
J3:K7) that gives the sum of ton-km of consignments sent from the city in cell I3.

Formula:

8
 5. Modification of Part Codes

Currently ABC company uses the following coding method for its pipes. A pipe code consists of a
minimum of 3 fields; additionally, an imported product consists of one more field, thus making the
maximum number of fields in a pipe code 4. A field is separated from its next field by a dash (-). The
three necessary fields are: 1. the pipe length in (integral) metres. The width of this field varies from 1
to 2 characters. 2. the diameter of the pipe in (integral) centimeters. The width of this field also varies
from one to two characters. 3. The material of the pipe. There are four categories of material possible:
steel, aluminium, plastic, and brass. These are to be denoted by the codes A, B, C, and D respectively
in the part code. In addition, if the pipe is imported its first field consists of the character F. Thus the
code F-5-8-B indicates that the pipe under question is an imported one, with length 5 metres and
diameter 8 centimeters, and that it is made of aluminium. Similarly, the code 8-15-D refers to the non-
imported brass pipe with length 8 metres and diameter 15 centimeters.

The above method has been designed several years back. The systems department, during a recent
study, suggested the following modifications to this coding system.

1. The first character of a pipe code should explicitly indicate whether the pipe is imported or
indigenous. The existing practice of using F as the first character for the imported ones should be
continued, whereas for the indigenous ones the character I should form the first field. This makes
the number of fields in each part code uniformly equal to four.

2. The material code which forms the last field of a part code should be more self-explanatory: it
should be the first character of the spelling for the concerned material. Accordingly, in the last (or
fourth) field of their part codes, steel pipes are denoted by S, aluminium pipes by A, plastic pipes
by P, and finally the brass ones by B.

3. To be consistent with some engineering specifications, the diameter of a pipe is to be denoted in

millimeters instead of in centimeters.

Consider for example the existing code 8-5-B. This indicates an indigenous pipe. Hence its first field
in the modified code should be I. The diameter of this pipe is 5 centimeters, which when expressed in
millimeters becomes 50. Hence the third field in the modified code should be 50. The material is
aluminium. Hence the fourth field of the modified code should consist of the character A. Thus the
modified code for the above pipe is I-8-50-A.

All the existing part codes are available in a spread sheet. We are required to produce the modified
code for each of the existing codes using the spread sheet facilities.

Figure MPC shows a spread sheet with a sample of 7 codes in column A, in the range A3:A9. The
other columns consist of various formulae to solve our problem. The new codes obtained by these
formulae are shown in column E. Columns B, C and D show the results of the intermediate steps in
converting the old codes to the new codes. The range G3:H6 consists of the table that shows the old
material codes and their corresponding new ones. Let us now explain in detail how the conversion of
the part codes is achieved. The formulae in the cells of each column are such that it is enough for us to
explicitly enter the formulae in row 3; others are obtained by copying these formulae to the cells in
the remaining rows. Hence, in the following discussion we focus on only the formulae in row 3 of
each column.

9
Figure MPC: Spreadsheet for part code change

10
 A B C D E F G H

1 OLDCOD NEWCODE
E
3 F-10-5-A S F-10-5-S F-10-5-S F-10-50-S A S

4 10-10-B A 10-10-A I-10-10-A I-10-100-A B A

5 8-15-C P 8-15-P I-8-15-P I-8-150-P C P

6 F-10-5-B A F-10-5-A F-10-5-A F-10-50-A D B

7 F-8-5-C P F-8-5-P F-8-5-P F-8-50-P

8 5-5-D B 5-5-B I-5-5-B I-5-50-B

9 F-4-4-A S F-4-4-S F-4-4-S F-4-40-S

11
6. Reformatting of Student IDs

12
 7. Number of Retirements

In XYZ company the retirement age of an employee is sixty years. However, as it is inconvenient to
retire an employee during the middle of a month, the company has decided that a retirement date
would be the last day of the month in which the employee completes sixty years. For example, if the
date of birth of an employee is January 2, 1955, she/he completes sixty years on January 2, 2015, and
her/his retirement date would be January 31, 2015. The employee codes and their respective dates of
birth are given in the adjacent columns of a range in a spreadsheet. Incorporate the features necessary
to find how many employees of the above list will retire during a given year and month. Further,
tabulate the number of retirements for a given list of years for each month. Solve the problem in two
different ways: (1) using the function EOMONTH, (2) without using the function EOMONTH. You
can use the following sample data for your work.

EmpCode Date Birth

ABC 03-Jan-49
CDE 19-Jul-51
VFR 18-Jun-55
HUU 05-May-54
EFG 09-Feb-40
FGH 10-May-41
GGG 02-Feb-44
HRS 03-May-40
GFD 04-Oct-49

13
 8. Customer Outstandings

The data on customer bills giving customer name, customer category, bill amount, and the date on
which the bill is due are given in columns A to D (row 5 onwards) of the spreadsheet below. In
addition, the creditlimit (number of days allowed for payment of a bill without any penalty) for each
customer category is given in the credit limit table in the range J5:K9. The rates at which penalty is
levied (rupees per day per rupee of the bill amount) for delayed payment are given in the penalty table
in the range H1:K2.
A B C D E F G H I J K

Ref ----
1 - Lower limit of range 0 1000 25000 50000
. (Rs.) 0
Dat
e:
2 Penalty Rate (Rs per day per 0.10 0.15 0.20 0.25
Rupee)
3 Customer Outstandings: Credit Limit Table
Customer Custome Bill Du Outstandin Penalt Penalt Penalty Custome Credit
4 Name r Amoun e g y Days y Amoun r
lim
Categor t Dat since Rate t Category
y e (days) it (in
days)
5 C1 C 80000 07/08/0 ------------ -------- -------- -------- A 90
6
6 C2 B 12000 11/08/0 B 60
6
7 C3 A 30000 20/09/0 C 45
6
8 C4 D 9000 05/10/0 D 30
6
9 C5 E 11000 05/09/0 E 15
6
1 C6 A 15000 20/09/0
0 6
1 C7 B 17000 15/10/0
1 6
1 C8 C 60000 20/09/0
2 6

Questions:
Enter a function in cell B1 which gives today’s date:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in the rows below) in E5 which computes the number of days
the bill is outstanding, using the due date given in cell D5 and the reference date in cell B1.

14
Formula in E5:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in rows below) in cell F5 to compute the penalty- days of the
bill in row 5. The penalty-days are computed by subtracting credit-limit applicable to the category
(given in cell B5) of customer, from the outstanding-days (obtained in cell E5).Penalty-days should be
zero if outstanding days are less than or equal to the credit limit. The applicable credit limit for this
computation should be obtained from the credit limit table in the range J5:K9. For example, customer
in row 5 belongs category C, for which the credit limit is 45 days; the pending days for this bill is the
difference of value you obtained in E5 and 45, if that is positive, otherwise zero.

Formula in F5:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in the rows below) in cell G5 to obtain the penalty rate
applicable to the bill amount in cell C5. The penalty rate applicable to entire bill amount (per day per
Rupee) is Rs.0.1 for amount less than Rs.10000; Rs.0.15 for amount more than or equal to Rs.10000
and less than 25000; and Rs.0.20 for amount more than or equal to Rs.25000 and less than 50000; and
Rs.0.25 for bill amount more than or equal to 50000. Develop the formula using this data, which is
given in the range H1:K2. Do not use IF function.

Formula in G5:

Enter a formula (to be copied to cells in the rows below) in the cell H5 to compute the penalty amount
for the bill in row 5 using bill amount, penalty days, and penalty rate.

Formula in H5:

15
 9. Top 100 of Forbes 20002

Given below is the list of top 100 companies of the Forbes 2000 list, March 2004 ( Source for the data
is the website: http://www.forbes.com/2004/03/24/04f2000land.html), arranged in ascending order of
rank. The ranks are obtained by developing a composite index using the following attributes of each
company: 1. sales, 2. profits, 3. assets, and 4. market value.

Enter the list into a spreadsheet. Reorganize the list by sorting it on each of the
dimensions mentioned above; additionally, sort it by country and category.

Develop a table showing for each country and category combination, the number of companies in the
list that come under the combination.

Using a suitable set of features to list all companies whose sales were more than $80 billion and
market value greater than or equal to $200 billion.

How many companies in the list are close to the maximum value in each attribute; that is, find the
number of companies whose sales is close to the highest sales in the list; find the number of
companies whose profit is close to the highest profit in the list, and so on. A company is considered
close to another company on a given dimension, if its value in that dimension is greater than a certain
given percentage (for example 95%) of the highest value in that dimension. Provide the percentage for
defining the closeness as a parameter.

Consider the idea of closeness to the top company as discussed in D above. Some companies are close
to the topmost company on one dimension, some on two dimensions, some on three, and some on all
four. Thus, depending on how many dimensions a company is close to the corresponding top most
company, you can classify companies into four classes. Count and display the companies belonging to
each class.

Prepare a table of total sales category-wise, and find the category with maximum sales.

Show all companies with profits greater than or equal to 20% of sales, or profits greater than or equal
to 10% of assets.

Sample Data
Forbes Market
Name Country Category Sales Profits Asset
2000 Value
($bil) ($bil) s
Rank ($bil)
($bil)
1 Citigroup United Banking 94.71 17.85 1,264.03 255.30
States
2 General United Conglomerates 134.19 15.59 626.93 328.54
Electric States
3 American Intl United Insurance 76.66 6.46 647.66 194.87
Group States
4 ExxonMobil United Oil & gas 222.88 20.96 166.99 277.02
States operation

2
This note is taken from IIMA/CISG0104TEC Spreadsheet through Examples: Microsoft Excel 2010
Version by Prof. V. Venkat Rao of IIM Ahmedabad

16
 s
5 BP United Oil & gas 232.57 10.27 177.57 173.54
Kingdom operation
s
6 Bank of United Banking 49.01 10.81 736.45 117.55
America States

17
 10. Analysis of Purchase Order Database

SNO PONO SUPNO Location Project VALUE LT

1 6 S1 Ajmer Road 1000 3
2 7 S4 Kishangarh Road 500 2
3 2 S2 Mumbai Road 2000 9
4 1 S3 Ajmer Dam 3000 5
5 5 S2 Ahmedabad Dam 700 7
6 4 S1 Mumbai Dam 800 8
7 9 S3 Kishangarh Airport 200 15
8 3 S5 Mumbai Airport 10000 10
9 10 S1 Ahmedabad Airport 15000 1
10 8 S6 Ajmer Dam 500 4
11 15 S4 Ahmedabad Dam 1000 5
12 16 S6 Ajmer Airport 1100 9
13 17 S1 Mumbai LPG 900 6
14 11 S4 Ajmer LPG 1200 5
15 18 S6 Mumbai LPG 700 4
16 12 S2 Achnera Dam 1300 6
17 19 S5 Mumbai Dam 500 3
18 13 S4 Alwar Dam 1400 7
19 20 S6 Mumbai Airport 600 8
20 14 S5 Ajmer Dam 1500 9

The above table shows the data on several purchase orders. For each order the data
items given are:

 Serial Number (SNO),

 Purchase Order Number (PONO),
 Supplier Number (SUPNO),
 Location,
 Project
 Value of the Order (VALUE), and
 Lead time (LT).

Using spread sheet answer the following questions:

a) How many orders were placed on supplier S1?

b) What is the total value of all orders placed on S1?
c) Of all orders placed on S1, what is the VALUE of the order with highest VALUE?
d) For each order placed on S1, show its LT and VALUE
e) Show all the details of purchase orders with value greater than 3000.

18
f) How many orders placed on S1 were supplied with lead time less than 4?
g) Show the details of all orders which had their LT in the range 5 and 8.
h) Which are the orders which had very low value ( VALUE <=500) or high value
(VALUE >=10000)
i) Show the row(s) related to highest value order(s) in the above table in green
colour and lowest value order(s) in red colour. The colours should change
automatically if the data changes.
j) Show the details of purchase order(s) with highest VALUE.
k) Show the details of purchase orders whose LT is greater than or equal to 70%
of the highest LT.
l) Develop a table that shows for each supplier the total value of orders placed
on the supplier
m) How many Dam projects are from Location Ajmer?
n) How many Projects are either Dam projects or from Location Ajmer?
o) How many Locations start from letter A?
p) How many Locations are six letter words?
q) How many total distinct Projects are there?
r) If next year the prices of all items increase by 10%, and if the same orders are
going to be placed on the same supplier, what would be the total payment to
S1 (next year).
s) From the given data produce three different data bases in the same spread
sheet by rearranging (and at the same time not disturbing) the given data in
the following orders:
a. ascending order of lead times,
b. descending order of value;
c. Ascending order of supplier codes.

19
 11. Multiplex Movies

Mr. Jolly Good wants to take his wife and two children to a movie in one of the multiplexes in the
evening. His requirement is that the movie should start between 6 PM (ie 18 hrs) and 7 PM (ie 19
hrs). He wants to know, therefore, all the movies that satisfy the above requirement, their theatres, and
the total ticket charge.

Suppose information related to the current starting time of each show for each movie in each
multiplex is given in range B3:H34 of a spreadsheet, as shown in the accompanying figure. The
different columns contain the following items:

Column B: Name of the multiplex in an abbreviated form.

Column C: Title of the movie. For long movie titles, abbreviations are used, as per the prevailing
fashion.

Column D: Language of the movie: E for English, empty cell for Hindi. Other language movies are
not shown in the multiplexes under consideration.

Columns E through H: Starting time, in 24-hour format, of the four shows respectively. A show never
starts before 11.30 AM, nor after 11.30 PM in the night. An empty cell indicates that the movie is not
scheduled for the corresponding show.

From the above data you need to extract the list of movie-multiplex combinations (along with other
relevant information) that satisfy Mr. Jolly Good's requirement. Mr. Jolly Good may want to
experiment with the spreadsheet by changing the desirable starting time window (for example,
between 5.00 PM and 6.00 PM, between 6.30 PM and 7.30 PM etc). The output should be written
starting from cell P4, and using as many rows below it as needed, one row for each feasible multiplex-
movie combination.

Additionally, for each theatre and movie combination produced above, you need to compute the ticket
charge for four tickets for the silver and gold classes, and write them in adjoining cells after each row
of output produced above. For English movies some theatres offer concession; the concessional
charge is obtained by applying a given percentage of concession on the normal charge. Hindi movies
are charged at the normal rates. The normal charges for both the classes, and the percentage
concession for English movies are given in the spreadsheet itself.

Compute in one cell the minimum charge among all the feasible options.

Show neatly a layout of the additional cells used by you in answering the above questions, and
explain in detail all the formulae and other contents.

20
 A B C D E F G H I J K L M N
1
2
3 Multiplex Movie Lang Show1 Show2 Show3 Show4 Multplxcode Mltplxame RsSilver RsGold Econcession
4 FR Terminator3 E 12.00 19.45 22.15 FR FunRepublic 90 100 25
5 FR ChoriChori 12.30 15.40 18.45 21.30 WA WideAngle 90 100 25
6 FR DMH 12.15 14.45 17.15 22.00 CG CityGold 90 100 0
7 FR Hungama 12.15 15.20 18.30 21.45 RW Rworld 80 100 50
8 FR Jaai 12.15
9 FR Jhankar Beats 14.15
10 FR MPKDH 15.15 18.35 Moviecode Expansion
11 FR Oops 12.45 18.45 22.00 MPKDH MainPremKiDiwaniHoon
12 FR Qayamat 15.45 DMH DarnaManaHai
13 FR Deewarein 17.00 19.30 22.15
14 WA Hungama 12.15 15.15 18.30 22.00
15 WA ChoriChori 12.00 14.30 19.30 22.15
16 WA Oops 12.30 17.00 22.15
17 WA MPKDH 15.15
18 WA Qayamat 18.30
19 WA Terminator3 E 11.30 15.45 20.00
20 WA DMH 13.30 17.45 22.15
21 CG Hungama 12.00 15.15 18.30 21.45
22 CG ChoriChori 12.30 15.30 18.30 22.00
23 CG Oops 12.15 15.15 22.00
24 CG Qayamat 18.15
25 CG DMH 12.30 15.30 18.30 22.00
26 CG MPKDH 11.45 15.00 22.00
27 CG Terminator3 18.00 20.00
28 RW Hungama 12.30 16.15 19.15 22.15
29 RW ChoriChori 15.00 18.00 20.15 22.30
30 RW Oops 16.00 18.00
31 RW Deewarein 14.00
32 RW DMH 12.00 22.30
33 RW Qayamat 12.00
34 RW Terminator3 E 14.30

21
 12. Sales Consolidation and Forecasting

Monthly data on sales of different products by different salesman available on

different sheets in the format shown below:
Sales Data for the month of January:
Salesman Product Sales Qty
S001 P002 500
S001 P002 200
S001 P003 150
S002 P001 70
S002 P003 250
S003 P002 120
s003 P003 100
S004 P001 130
S004 P002 80
S004 P003 200

Nine such sheets (for months January to September) are available, each giving the
details of the sales executed by different salesman for different products during a
month. In. addition to this a table of prices of the products is also available in the
following format:
Product Price Table
Unit Price.
Product
(Rs.)
P001 100
P002 300
P003 250
P004 200
Questions:
Develop a spread sheet solution to:

a) Consolidate the first nine months (January to September) data to obtain the
total value of sales of each product and of each salesman so far.
b) Forecast the sales for the remaining three months (October, November,
and December) using trend analysis. Perform this for each salesman, each
product and each product-salesman combination.

22
 13. Summer Placements

The Student Placement Committee (SPC), of a Management Institute, which deals with summer
placements, collects information on student preferences (3 for each student) for the companies in
which they would like to do their summer job. The SPC also records the information on the
placements accomplished from time to time in the following spreadsheet:

A B C D E F G H I J
1 Summer Company
Placements Preference
at PMI Summary
2 Student Placements Preference#
Preferences
3 SCode 1 2 3 Placed In Preference Company 1
4 S01 TCS SHELL IOCL IOCL ---------- SHELL --------------
5 S02 HPCL ONGC TCS HPCL
6 S03 SHELL IOCL HPCL SHELL IOCL
7 S04 IOCL TCS GSPC GSPC TCS
8 S05 HPCL ONGC GSPC ONGC GSPC
9 S06 TCS SHELL ONGC ONGC
10 S07 SHELL HPCL IOCL HPCL
11 S08 TCS ONGC HPCL ONGC Student
Placement
Summary
12 S09 ONGC IOCL TCS Preference# No. Placed % to
Total
13 S10 GSPC ONGC HPCL GSPC 1 ------------ ----------
14 S11 SHELL GSPC TCS SHELL 2
15 S12 HPCL ONGC TCS 3
16 S13 SHELL TCS HPCL HPCL Not Placed -----------
17 S14 IOCL HPCL ONGC IOCL
18 S15 GSPC ONGC IOCL
19 S16 SHELL GSPC HPCL GSPC

In each row of the spreadsheet, the column A contains the student code,
and columns B, C, D contain the names of the first, second and third
preference companies to which the student would like to go for placement.
As students go through the selection process and get placed, the SPC
enters names of the companies which offered placement in column E
(which is initially blank). Sample data for 16 students and 5 companies is
displayed in the spreadsheet above (A4:E19).

Q1: Enter a formula in the cell F4 (to be copied to cells F5 through F19)
that gives the Preference number (1, 2, or 3) of the company in the cell E4
(Placed In) of student in the cell A4. For example, it is 3 for this student.
Do not use IF function for this Answer.

23
Q1Formula:

Q2: Enter a formula in the cell I4 (to be copied to cells I5 through I9) that
gives the total number of students who have given the company in cell H4
as the preference number given in cell I3. For example it is 5 for SHELL
as 1st preference. The value entered in cell I3 could be 1, 2, or 3.
Accordingly, the result should be for 1 st, 2nd or 3rd preferences. Do not use
IF function for this Answer.

Q2 Formula:

Q3: Enter a formula in the cell I13 (to be copied to cells I14 through I15)
that gives the number of students placed in the company of their
preference number given in cell H13.

Q3Formula:

Q4: Enter a formula in the cell I16 that gives the number of students

not placed so far. Q4 Formula:

Q5: Enter a formula in the cell J13 (to be copied to cells J14 through J15)
that gives the percentage (to the total number of students) of students
placed as per the preference number given in H13.

Q5 Formula:

24
 14. Analysis of Revenues
Customer-wise revenues from three major services offered by an advertising agency are
given in the worksheet below:

Questions

a) Enter a formula in E3 (to be copied to subsequent rows), to obtain total contribution from
customer in cell A3 (HLL) through all three services offered by the agency. Use the
contribution-factors given in cells B13, C13 and D13 for Service1, Service2, and Service3
respectively. The amount of contribution from any service is obtained by multiplying the
revenue from that service with the corresponding contribution factor.

b) Enter a formula (to be copied to next columns) for the Total Contribution cell under Service1
column (i.e. cell B14), using the contribution factor given B13 and the revenue figures given
for this service in rows 3 to 11.

c) Enter a formula in B15 (to be copied to next columns), to obtain the contribution of Service1
as a percentage of total contribution.

d) The customers are grouped into zones based on some business considerations. The current
zone table is given in columns I and J. Based on this, enter formulae for the cells in the North,
East, West, and South rows under the Service1 column (cells B17, B18, B19, B20), to obtain
zone-wise totals of the Service1 contributions. You may use the column(s) G (and H) and the
space below the zone tables in columns I and J for any intermediate work. The solution must
work for any change of customer zones in the zone table.

e) Enter formulae to extend the answer of question 4 to Service2 and Service3 columns to obtain
total contributions of these services for North, East, South, and West zones.

f) The contribution from Service1 is likely to vary from 0.1 to 0.7 (in steps of 0.1), while the
contribution from Service2 is likely to vary from 0.4 to 0.8 (in steps of 0.05). The
contribution from Service3 is not likely to alter. Obtain a two-way table from row 22 and
column B onwards, in which the total contribution values for each pair of contribution factors
of Service1 and Service2 are tabulated.

g) Write a sequence of commands to find (display) the customers whose

a. Total contribution (Column E) from all services is greater than the average of the
total contribution from all customers.
b. Revenue is the highest from any service.
c. Revenue of Service3 is more than the sum of revenues from other two services.

25
 A B C D E F G H I J
1 Revenues in Rs.'000 Total %
2 Customer Service1 Service2 Service3 Contribution to Total Customer Zone
-----------
3 HLL 1000 1500 800 -------------- DABUR North

4 SAIL 1200 1000 1600 HLL North

5 TVS 750 3000 2800 SAIL East
6 NIRMA 2000 4000 3000 BPL East
7 DABUR 1000 1200 2200 TVS South
8 BAJAJ 1200 1350 4000 HMT South
9 IPCL 800 600 300 NIRMA West
10 HMT 3000 2000 1000 BAJAJ West
11 BPL 2500 1500 2750 IPCL West
12
13 Contri.factor 0.3 0.6 0.4
14 Total Contri ---------- ---------- ----------- -------------
15 % to Total ---------- ---------- ----------
16 Zone Totals:
17 North ---------- ---------- ----------
18 East ---------- ---------- ----------
19 West ---------- ---------- ----------
20 South ---------- ---------- ----------

26
 15. Demand Estimation Of Information Products

In a demand assessment survey, data were collected on the level of satisfaction on

four dimensions (coverage, reliability, timeliness, and convenience) of existing
products. These products are those offering conceptual information, case studies,
statistical databases, and technical reports. For each product type, respondents were
asked to give a score between 1 and 4 (1 for least and 4 for most) for what they
wanted (wntd) and what they received (recd) of each dimension. A sample data for
twelve respondents is given in the Annexure.

Using this data, it is required to study the scope of introducing the new products by
improving the dimension in which the respondents experience deficiency in the
existing products. The deficiency in any dimension experienced by a respondent is
measured as the difference of the wanted score and received score given by him for
that dimension. If such difference is greater than zero (as in the case of respondent 1
for coverage dimension of conceptual products, the wanted is 4, received is 2 and the
difference is 2), it is called positive deficiency. The total of such positive
deficiencies across all respondents for a product type and a dimension is called total
potential deficiency (TPD) of that product type-dimension combination. For our
problem we will have 16 TPD values. The TPD of a product type-dimension
combination divided by the number of respondents having positive deficiency for
that combination is called the average potential deficiency (APD). If a respondent is
satisfied with any dimension of a product type, his wanted score is less than or equal
to the received score for that dimension and the difference would be negative (for
example respondent 2, for product type reports on coverage dimension – wanted 2,
received 4; thus the deficiency is 2-4 =-2). We do not consider such respondents for
our TPD computations as they do not have deficiency.

It is required to compute and tabulate the APDs for each product and in each
dimension as shown below.

It is also required to compute the percentage of respondents (to the total number of
respondents) having the positive deficiency for each product type and in each
dimension, and tabulate them as shown below.

27
 Table of Average Potential Deficiencies (APD)

Product Dimension
Type Coverage Reliability Timeliness Convenience
Conceptual
Cases
Databases
Reports

Table of Percentage of Respondents with Positive Deficiencies (%D)

Product Dimension
Type Coverage Reliability Timeliness Convenience
Conceptual
Cases
Databases
Reports

Questions (See Annexure-II for expected results):

Develop spreadsheet based solution to obtain the above two tables.

Develop a single table which puts together the APD and %D values in a single cell for each product
type – dimension combination.

Hint: Use 4 extra columns, one for each dimension, to compute the deficiency values (of each
respondent) in that dimension and use those results for further computations and tabulations.

Annexure I: Sample Data for 12 Respondents

Coverage Reliability Timeliness Convenience

RespN ProdTyp cvwnt cvrec rlwnt rlrec tmwnt tmrec conwnt co
o e d d d d d d d nr
ec
d
1 conceptua 4 2 4 3 3 2 3 2
l
1 cases 2 1 4 1 4 1 4 1
1 databases 3 2 3 3 2 1 3 1
1 reports 4 4 2 3 1 2 3 2
2 conceptua 3 2 3 2 4 3 4 2
l
2 cases 4 1 4 3 3 1 2 1
2 databases 2 2 4 2 2 2 1 3
2 reports 2 4 2 1 2 3 1 4
3 conceptua 2 2 2 3 1 3 2 2
l
3 cases 4 1 4 3 2 1 4 1

28
3 databases 3 1 2 1 3 2 3 2
3 reports 2 2 2 4 4 3 2 3
4 conceptua 4 2 1 1 4 2 4 1
l
4 cases 2 1 4 1 4 2 3 1
4 databases 3 2 3 3 2 2 4 4
4 reports 1 3 2 4 2 3 1 4
5 conceptua 2 1 4 1 4 1 4 1
l
5 cases 3 2 3 3 2 1 3 1
5 databases 4 4 2 3 1 2 3 2
5 reports 3 2 3 2 4 3 4 2
6 conceptua 4 1 4 3 3 1 2 1
l
6 cases 2 2 4 2 2 2 1 3
6 databases 2 4 2 1 2 3 1 4
6 reports 1 3 2 3 1 3 2 2
7 conceptua 4 1 4 3 2 1 4 1
l
7 cases 3 1 2 1 3 2 3 2
7 databases 2 2 2 4 4 3 2 3
7 reports 4 2 1 1 4 2 4 1
8 conceptua 2 1 4 1 4 2 3 1
l
8 cases 3 2 3 3 2 2 4 4
8 databases 1 3 2 4 2 3 1 4
8 reports 4 1 4 3 3 1 2 1
9 conceptua 2 2 4 2 2 2 1 3
l
9 cases 2 4 2 1 2 3 1 4
9 databases 1 3 2 3 1 3 2 2
9 reports 4 1 4 3 2 1 4 1
10 conceptua 3 1 2 1 3 2 3 2
l
10 cases 2 2 2 4 4 3 2 3
10 databases 4 2 1 1 4 2 4 1
10 reports 2 1 4 1 4 2 3 1
11 conceptua 3 2 3 3 2 2 4 4
l
11 cases 1 3 2 4 2 3 1 4
11 databases 2 1 4 1 4 1 4 1
11 reports 3 2 3 3 2 1 3 1
12 conceptua 4 4 2 3 1 2 3 2
l
12 cases 3 2 3 2 4 3 4 2
12 databases 4 1 4 3 3 1 2 1
12 reports 2 2 4 2 2 2 1 3

29
Annexure II: Expected Results

APD Table
Coverage Reliability Timeliness Convenience
conceptual 1.67 1.75 1.63 1.89
cases 1.63 1.63 1.5 2
databases 1.67 1.6 1.67 1.83
reports 1.83 1.5 1.43 2

%D Table
Coverage Reliability Timeliness Convenience
conceptual 0.75 0.67 0.67 0.75
cases 0.67 0.67 0.67 0.58
databases 0.5 0.42 0.5 0.5
reports 0.5 0.5 0.58 0.58

APD & %D Table

Coverage Reliability Timeliness Convenience
conceptual 1.67-75% 1.75-67% 1.63-67% 1.89-75%
cases 1.63-67% 1.63-67% 1.50-67% 2.00-58%
databases 1.67-50% 1.60-42% 1.67-50% 1.83-50%
reports 1.83-50% 1.50-50% 1.43-58% 2.00-58%

30
 16. Status Reporting Of Receivables

To track accounts receivables from customers, sale transaction data of a

company are entered in a spreadsheet in the format given below:

A B C D E F G
Ref.
1 Analysis of Receivables Symbol Days
Date:
2 ------ # 15
OD
3 Customer Amount(Rs.) Duedate Rcvddate Remark
Remark
4 IPCL 12000 05/08/2005 ---------- ----------
5 ABB 17500 25/07/2005 15/07/2005
6 GEB 25000 29/06/2005 05/07/2005
7 AEC 80000 29/06/2005
8 GNFC 52000 20/06/2005 10/07/2005
9 BSL 35000 30/07/2005 01/06/2005
10 RIL 75000 17/07/2005
11 BSNL 12500 08/07/2005 01/06/2005
12 IFFCO 50000 29/05/2005 15/07/2005

For each sale transaction, customer code, value of the sale (in Rs.), and
payment due date are given in columns A, B, and C respectively. When
payment (assume full payment) is received against a sale transaction, the
date of receipt is recorded in the corresponding row in the Rcvddate
column (D).

Questions

Give a formula to enter today’s date as reference date in cell E2.

Formula:

Give a formula for cell E4 (to be copied to cells below) to give a Remark as follows:

If the customer has made payment, i.e. cell D4 is not blank, compute the difference
between the Rcvd date (cell D4) and the Due date (cell C4). If this difference is
negative, the Remark is “PBT” (paid before time). Otherwise it is “Delayed”.

31
If the customer has not made payment, i.e. cell D4 is blank, compute the difference
between the Ref. Date (cell E2) and the Due date (cell C4). If this difference is
negative, the Remark is “DNE” (due date not elapsed). Otherwise the result is the
difference itself.

Formula:

Give a formula for cell F4 to give the OD Remark as: one symbol (given in cell F2,
say ‘#’) for each period of delay given in cell G2 (say 15 days). For example, if the
value in E4 is 25, display two “#” symbols. The OD Remark should be blank for all
other cases.

Formula:

32
 17. Location Of Fair Price Shops

A certain backward region of a district has around 15 villages. It is required to work out a scheme of
setting up fair price shops at some of these villages such that people living in those villages and in
some of the nearby villages can get provisions at subsidized prices.

Amongst 15 villages, only 5 villages (call them centres) have facilities such as electricity, telephone,
water supply, road connectivity, markets, schools, and health centres.

If these shops are set up, one each, in these centres, it is possible to manage those shops without
difficulty. However, the total cost of setting up fair price shops at all these 5 centres is prohibitive and
is beyond the budget. It is therefore required to select only a minimal set of these centres which
provide good coverage at minimal cost.

The (x,y) co-ordinates of these villages on the map are available, from which the distances between
the villages can be computed. The population of each village is also available. For each centre, the
cost of setting up a fair price shop is also available.

Question

Develop a spreadsheet based solution to interactively workout the following:

For acceptable distances(of say 5 km, 6 km, 6.5 km, 7 km,…) to be travelled by a person from any
village to reach a center (nearest) to get the service:

Whether any given set of centers can satisfy the above criterion (feasibility).
If feasible, obtain a minimum cost solution covering all villages with that service level. Use the
following co-ordinates and cost data of the villages to develop the solutions

:
Villages-> 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15
X (km) 3 8 16 8 12 17 4 14 10 4 9 14 10 17 11
Y (km) 3 2 2 5 6 6 8 10 12 13 14 14 15 18 18
Population('000 8 2 3 3 5 4 1 2 10 4 1 7 9 3 4
)
Cost(Rs'000) 15 10 20 15 20

Villages 1,5,9, 12, and 13 are identified as centres and the cost of setting up a fair price shop at these
centres is given in the last row of the table.

33
Extension:

Try your solution with following data of 50 villages and 15 centers. The data is presented in a
compact format. Use a convenient format for organizing this data on the spreadsheet.

Villages X(km) Y(km) Villages X(km) Y(km) Centers VilCode Cost

1 3 3 26 15 6 1 4 8
2 8 2 27 15 7 2 5 10
3 16 2 28 13 8 3 6 10
4 8 5 29 7 6 4 9 20
5 12 6 30 5 6 5 12 15
6 17 6 31 10 6 6 18 18
7 4 8 32 8 8 7 50 10
8 14 10 33 8 9 8 34 8
9 10 12 34 11 9 9 22 6
10 4 13 35 10 10 10 27 15
11 9 14 36 10 12 11 47 10
12 14 14 37 13 10 12 13 20
13 10 15 38 6 13 13 38 6
14 17 18 39 6 15 14 41 10
15 11 18 40 5 14 15 44 8
16 4 4 41 8 16      
17 6 2 42 8 17      
18 5 4 43 11 18      
19 7 3 44 11 16      
20 10 3 45 12 13      
21 12 2 46 16 16      
22 14 3 47 14 16      
23 15 4 48 14 18      
24 17 4 49 10 8      
25 16 5 50 6 10      

34
 18. Allocation Of Police Guards

To control the traffic and to maintain law and order, a city is divided into 12 areas and each area is
provided with a certain number of policeguards(PG). Each guard is a unit consisting of around 3 to5
Police Constables (PC) and 1 to 2 Head Constables (HC). There are 3 types of PGs (PG1, PG2, and
PG3) with strengths shown in table in the range J4:L6 of the worksheet below. These PGs are drawn
from the city police force which is organized into companies, each having the same number of PCs
(say 40) and HCs (say 16) given in Cells K9 and L9. The companies provide required number of PGs
to all the areas of the city. To facilitate their management, an area is provided all its requirements by
one company only. However, a company can provide PGs to more than one area.

Based on the sensitivity of each location, the Police Commissioner decides the type and the number of
PGs to be posted in that location. Assume that an area is posted with same type of PGs. Spreadsheet
below gives sample data for the problem.

  A B C D E F G H I J K L
Allocation of Traffic
Guards
1                  
 

PG
GTyp ReqN PC HC CumP CumH Compa
2 Area   Compositi    
e o s s C C ny No
on Table
3           0 0 1   GType PC HC
----
4 A1 PG1 3 --- -------- -------- --------   PG1 4 2
-
5 A2 PG2 2             PG2 5 2
6 A3 PG1 4             PG3 3 1
7 A4 PG3 2                  
TP TH
8 A5 PG3 4             Company
C C
9 A6 PG1 3             Balances 40 16
1 ----- -----
A7 PG1 5             1
0 - -
1
A8 PG2 4             2    
1
1
A9 PG1 2             3    
2
1
A10 PG2 3             4    
3
1
A11 PG2 2             5    
4
1
A12 PG3 3             6    
5

Question 1:

It is required to develop a spreadsheet based solution to allocate companies providing the

required number of PGs to all the areas of the city. Steps for a scheme are given below.

35
 You are required to follow them and fill in the blanks.

Step 1: Enter a formula in cell D4 (to be copied to rows below), which computes the
number of PCs required by the area in A4, using the data on type and number of PGs
given in the cells B4 and C4, and the PG composition table in J4:L6 .

Formula:

Step 2: Enter a formula in cell E4 (to be copied to rows below), which computes the
number of HCs required by the area in A4, using the data on type and number of PGs
given in the cells B4 and C4, and the PG composition table in J4:L6 .

Formula:

Step 3: We will use a simple algorithm for the company allocation. It is as follows:

Start the allocation with company 1 (set value of cell H3 to 1). Also set allocated to
number of PCs and HCs from the current company (cells F3 and G3) to zero, as shown in
the worksheet. Start with first area (row 4)

Add the required number of PCs of the area (obtained in step1) to the value in previous
row of CumPC column (allotted number of PCs from the current company so far).
Similarly, add the required number of HCs of the area (obtained in step2) value previous
row of CumHC column (allotted number of HCs from the current company so far). Only if
both these totals are less than the corresponding strengths of PCs and HCs (for example,
40 PC and 16 HC) of the company, retain them as the cumulative totals for the current
row. Otherwise take the required PCs and HCs of the area as cumulative totals (since the
current company has inadequate balance strength and we allot the required numbers from
the next company).

Depending on the outcome of step be above, the current company number is retained or
incremented by one.

Assume that the requirements of each area can be met with the capacities of the companies
and the number of companies.

Develop formulae for the steps b and c, (in F4and G4 for step b and in H4 for step c), to be
copied to rows below (to extend to all areas). Values in Column H (H4:H15) give the codes
of the companies allotted to each area.

Note: Pick up the strengths of PCs and HCs in a company from cells K9 and L9,
respectively.

S3b: Formula (in Cell F4):

36
Formula (in Cell G4):

S3c Formula (in Cell H4)

:

Question 2: Balance Strength:

Q2a. Enter a formula in cell K10 (to be copied to cells K11 through K15) that gives the
balance strength of PCs in the company, after allocation is made to all areas through the
steps above.

Q2a Formula:

Q2b. Enter a formula in cell L10 (to be copied to cells L11 through L15) that gives the
balance strength of HCs in the company, after allocation is made to all areas through the
steps above.

Q2b Formula:

37
 19. Networks Problems for Practice

Problem 1: A Transhipment Problem

The Bavarian Motor Company (BMC) manufactures expensive luxury Hamburg,

Germany, and exports cars to sell in the United States. The exported cars are shipped
from Hamburg to ports in Newark, New Jersey Jacksonville, Florida. From these
ports, the cars are transported by rail to distributors located in Boston, Massachusetts;
Columbus, Ohio; Atlanta, Georgia; Richmond, Virginia; and Mobile, Alabama.
Figure 1 shows the possible shipping routes available to the company along with the
transportation cost for shipping each car along the indicated path.
Currently, 200 cars are available at the port in Newark and 300 an able in
Jacksonville. The numbers of cars needed by the distributors in Columbus, Atlanta,
Richmond, and Mobile are 100, 60, 170, 80, and 70, respectively. BMC would like to
determine the least costly way of transportation from the ports in Newark and
Jacksonville to the cities where they are needed.

Figure 1: Figure for Bavarian Motor Company

38
 Figure 2: Figure of ACA

Problem 2: A Shortest Path Problem

The American Car Association (ACA) provides a variety of travel-related services to

its members, including information on vacation destinations, discount hotel
reservations, emergency road assistance, and travel route planning. This last service,
travel route planning, is one of its most popular services. When members of the ACA
are planning to take a driving trip, they call the organization’s toll-free 800 number
and indicate what cities they will be travelling from and to. The ACA then determines
an optimal route for travelling between these cities. The ACA's computer data bases
of major highways and intestates are kept up to date with information on construction
delays and detours and estimated travel times along various segments of roadways.
Members of the ACA often have different objectives in planning driving trips. Some
are interested in identifying routes that minimize travel times. Others, with more
leisure time on their hands, wish to identify the most scenic route to their desired
destination. The ACA would like to develop an automated system for identifying an
optimal travel plan for its members.

To see how the ACA could benefit by solving shortest path problems, consider the
simplified network shown in Figure 2 for a travel member who wants to drive from
Birmingham, Alabama to Virginia Beach, Virginia. The nodes in this graph represent
different cities and the arcs indicate the possible travel routes between cities. For each
arc, the figure lists both the estimated driving time to travel the road represented by
each arc and the number of points that route has received on the ACA’s system for
rating the scenic quality of the various routes. Solving this problem as a network flow
model requires the various nodes to have some supply or demand. In figure, node 1
(Birmingham) has a supply of 1, node 11 (Virginia Beach) has a demand of 1, and all
others nodes have a demand (or supply) of 0. We may view this model as a
transhipment problem, and we may find quickest way or the most scenic way of
shipping 1 unit of flow from node 1 to node 11. The route this unit of supply takes
corresponds to either the shortest path or the most scenic path through the network,
depending on which objective is being pursued.

39
Problem 3: Generalized Network Flow Problems

Nancy Grant is the owner of Coal Bank Hollow Recycling, a company that
specializes in collecting and recycling paper products. Nancy's company uses two
different recycling processes to convert newspaper, mixed paper, white office paper,
and cardboard into paper pulp. The amount of paper pulp extracted from the
recyclable materials and the cost of extracting the pulp differs depending on which
recycling process is used. able 1summarizes the recycling processes:

Table 1: Cost and Yield of Recycling

Processes
Recycling Process 1 Recycling Process 2
Cost/
Material Yield Cost/ ton Yield
ton
Newspaper $13 90% $12 85%
Mixed Paper $11 80% $13 85%
White Office Paper $9 95% $10 90%
Cardboard $13 75% $14 85%

For instance, every ton of newspaper subjected to recycling process 1 costs $13 and yields
0.9 tons of paper pulp. The paper pulp produced by the two different recycling
processes goes through other operations to be transformed into pulp for newsprint,
packaging paper, or print stock quality paper. The yields associated with transforming
the recycled pulp into pulp for the final products are summarized in Table 2.

Table 2: Cost and Yield of Final Product

Newsprint Packaging Paper Print Stock

Pulp
Cost/ton Yield Cost/ton Yield Cost/ton Yield
Source
Recycling
$5 95% $6 90% $8 90%
Process 1
Recycling
$6 90% $8 95% $7 95%
Process 2

For instance, a ton of pulp exiting recycling process 2 can be transform into 0.95 tons
of packaging paper pulp at a cost of $8. Nancy currently has 70 tons of newspaper, 50
tons of mixed paper, 30 to of white office paper, and 40 tons of cardboard. She would
like to determine the most efficient way of converting these materials into 60 tons of
newspaper pulp, 40 tons of packaging paper pulp, and 50 tons of print stock pulp.

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Problem 4: Maximal Flow Problem

The Northwest Petroleum Company operates an oil field and refinery in Alaska. The
crude obtained from the oil field is pumped through the network of pumping
substations shown in Figure 3 to the company's refinery located 500 miles from the
oil field. The amount of oil that can flow through each of the pipelines, represented by
the arcs in the network, varies due to differing pipe diameters. The numbers next to
the arcs in the network indicate the maximum amount of oil that can flow through the
various pipelines (measured in thousands of barrels per hour). The company wants to
determine the maximum number of barrels per hour that can flow from the oil field to
the refinery.

Figure 3: Figure for Refinery Problem

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