Decision Analysis Case Study Ch 3

Problem Statement

Jim Kelly, a corporate raider, has acquired a textile company and is contemplating the future of one of its major plants, located in Downtown Silver Spring, Maryland. Three alternatives decisions are being considered: (1) expand the plant and produce and produce lightweight, durable materials for possible sales to the military, a market with little foreign competition; (2) maintain the status quo at the plant, continuing production of textile goods that are subject to heavy foreign competition; or (3) sell the plant now. If one of the first two alternatives is chosen, the plant will still be sold at the end of a year. The amount of profit that could be earned by selling the plant in a year depends on foreign market conditions, including the status of a trade embargo bill in Congress. The following payoff table describes this decision.

	State of Nature
Decision	Good Foreign Competitive Conditions	Poor Foreign Competitive Condition
Expand	$900,000	$600,000
Maintain status quo	1,400,000	-150,000
Sell now	420,000	420,000

1. Determine the best decision by using the following criteria:

1. Maximax
2. Maximin
3. Minimax regret
4. Huwicz ( = 0.3)
5. Equal likelihood

2. Assume that it is now possible to estimate a probability of 0.70 that good foreign competitive conditions will exist and a probability of 0.30 that poor conditions will exist. Determine the best decision by using expected value and expected opportunity loss.
3. Compute the expected value of perfect information
4. Develop a decision tree, with expected values at the probability nodes.