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This supplement to Mustang Music (A), product #9B10E009, introduces students to data modeling, database implementation and database querying.

In June 2008, the Kimpton Hotels' area director of revenue management (director) for Washington, D.C. was trying to process the most recent customer information report from Priceline.com (Priceline). In an attempt to improve revenues during periods of low occupancy at the hotel, the director had recently been using Priceline's name your own price bidding format. While using this sales channel had limited success, the director was wondering the best way to maximize the revenue coming from Priceline without cannibalizing existing sales or tarnishing the Kimpton brand. His challenge was to create a pricing strategy that would determine the optimal posted price for rooms in the Washington, D. C. hotel as well as the number of rooms that should be provided to Priceline.

In June 2008, the Kimpton Hotels' area director of revenue management (director) for Washington, D.C. finished creating a pricing strategy that would determine the optimal posted price for rooms in the Washington, D. C. hotel as well as the number of rooms that should be provided to Priceline.com. He realized there was even more potential to gain revenue by posting more than one price; however, this would add further complexity into the strategy and he was unsure of the potential impact of having multiple posted prices.

The Kimpton Hotels' area director of revenue management (director) for Washington, D.C. was excited about using Priceline.com to help fill rooms on some of Kimpton's low-demand weekends. He estimated the coming weeks' demand across three rate classes and across three lengths of stay (LOS), and he wanted to make sure he did not use Priceline.com too aggressively by releasing too many rooms onto the site.

The chief executive officer (CEO) of Taiwan Taxi must assess the adoption of iCall by the firm's taxi drivers. When originally conceived, iCall was supposed to be the basis for substantial growth in the number of taxi drivers signing up with Taiwan Taxi. But even after many years, adoption still lags behind the plan. The CEO must assess the reasons for the slower adoption of iCall and make recommendations on whether to revise the goal or improve adoption in order to meet it. The case demonstrates the many complexities involved in realizing business value from the adoption of information technology.

This note complements Note on Logistic Regression, product #9B10E005 and Note on Logistic Regression - The Binomial Case, product #9B10E012. The focus of this note is to show how to calculate the associated p-values of the estimated beta coefficients using Microsoft Excel. It also illustrates the procedure based on the example from the Note on Logistic Regression - The Binomial Case.

The chief executive officer (CEO) of TriDev Realty Partners, was considering an offer of $22.5 million that she had received for TriDev's Uptown Plaza shopping centre. Although she was looking to divest the property within a year, and the offer appeared attractive based on current income levels, she knew that a number of lease renewals were pending, which could increase the value of the property. Should the CEO sell now or wait until the lease renewals were in place?

The media frequently report on the high cost of various health-related treatments. As there is a limit to the resources available to public and private health plans, they are not able to make all new treatments available. This raises questions about how to determine which treatments should be offered under a health plan. Cost effectiveness analysis has emerged as a powerful tool to help determine priorities and guide these policy decisions. This note is intended as a background reading for a first class on pharmacoeconomics or cost effectiveness analysis.

Pinnacle West is in the energy-related services business and headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona. Its largest subsidiary, APS, is a power utility that serves over a million customers across Arizona. The case was written when one of the biggest recessions in recent history hit global and U.S. markets. Written from the perspective of the vice-president and chief information officer, the case chronicles the various recent successful process change initiatives at Pinnacle West. The vice-president has achieved initial success in instituting a process-oriented culture inside his own information technology (IT) services organization, and in some specific business units within Pinnacle West. He now faces a significant crossroads in his process orientation strategy for Pinnacle West. He has to devise a strategy for a wider rollout of a process-oriented strategy throughout Pinnacle West and determine if the larger enterprise is ready for this strategy. He has to consider various issues in making this decision - resource availability, change management competency and buy-in from other top-level managers. He has to carefully weigh the various options in rolling out this strategy, as he fears that any misstep may derail his carefully executed plans for bringing a process-oriented approach to managing at Pinnacle West. This case can be used in an introductory systems course. It can also be used in a course on business process management or operations management.

The case illustrates a sports betting product offered by the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Commission. The particular game involved has odds that favour the bettor over the game provider under certain settings. The supplement B case, product 9B09E015, summarizes the results from a series of bets made and provides an email response from the game provider following the discontinuation of this particular game. The case provides an interesting introduction into probability or simulation and expected value calculations.

This supplement to OLGC Finds Its Match (A), product # 9B09E014, summarizes the results from a series of bets and provides the email response from the game provider following the discontinuation of this particular game.

<p style="color: rgb(197, 183, 131);"><strong> AWARD WINNER -INFORMS Case and Teaching Materials Competition, 3rd place</strong></p><br>A freelance geologist was asked for advice regarding two mining claims to property on Sturgeon Lake, near Thunder Bay, Ontario. Specifically, he was asked if there was enough gold on the property to pursue an economically feasible mining opportunity. The geologist determined that an analytical approach would best aid the analysis of the multiple factors he would need to consider in arriving at a decision about whether or not to proceed with the mining operation. The first stage in ore extraction involved building an access road, and the second stage was to implement a drilling program. There was considerable uncertainty surrounding the costs and actual feasibility of completion of these stages; yet only when these stages were completed could actual mining of the property begin. If mining proceeded, it was assumed it would take 10 years to extract all the gold from the site, and the total amount of gold in the mine would be extracted at an even rate over the 10-year period. Mining costs were assumed to be $30 an ounce, and the geologist used a discount rate of 20 per cent before taxes when evaluating projects.

In recent years, many countries with publicly funded healthcare have started using cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) along with review of clinical data as a tool to assess the overall benefit of a new drug to the society and set priorities with regards to health care budget. Cost effectiveness was formally incorporated into the Ontario drug review system in 1993 and the Canadian drug-review system in 2003. The issue of using cost effectiveness has become increasingly contentious in recent years: some newly approved cancer drugs cost $3,000 to $6,000 or more for one treatment cycle, but their high prices means that they were often classified as being not cost effective. This note reviews many of the competing interests in debates over drug funding and dilemmas about healthcare financing decisions in the presence of limited budgets.

A professor is considering buying a new car and is evaluating two models, one with air conditioning and a comfort package, the other with no extras. The two cars are relatively close in price but still above his initial budget, and he is wondering how much he might be able to negotiate the price. A factor that complicates the matter is that the car with the comfort package has a lower interest rate. The professor therefore needs to understand what the net present value of the difference in the two payment plans is.

One of the most basic revenue management problems is how to allocate a fixed capacity to various types of classes of customers so that the total profit is maximized. Using the example of a flight traveling from Toronto to Vancouver, the revenue management problem is to decide, in each period, how much of the realized demand to accept and how much to reserve for the latter classes in order maximize the revenue. The crux of the problem revolves around the trade-off between spoilage and dilution. The author uses various mathematical formulae (including the static model, Littlewood's Two-Class model and n-Class model of expected marginal seat revenue) to model optimal seat-allocation outcomes.

This note presents an overview of ways in which statistical arguments are used in court cases. Topics covered include linear regression, significance, independence, bias, conditional probability, Baye's Theorem and inversion of conditional probabilities. In addition to these topics, the note contains a number of true examples where statistical reasoning has been used or misused as part of a legal argument.

This note gives step-by-step instructions on how to build a Monte Carlo simulation model in Microsoft Excel without using spreadsheet add-ins. The note explains the difference between random and uniformly distributed. The note also explains: how the Excel function RAND() works, how to use Excel functions like NORMINV() to simulate random numbers from distributions other than the uniform; how to use VLOOKUP() with tabulated data to simulate numbers from any arbitrary distribution, and how to use Data Tables to produce multiple iterations of a simulation model. The note concludes with an example that illustrates the use of all of these concepts.

The manager of an upscale hotel in the heart of London, Ontario - The Clonlara - wanted to apply revenue management techniques to increase revenue at the hotel. Specifically, she wanted to apply quantitative analysis to determine how many rooms to discount for a Saturday night stay.

Due to continued budget shortfalls the project manager for the Spinal Cord Rehabilitation Program at the Toronto Rehabilitation Institute needed to provide proposals for immediate cost-saving measures. One of these measures included how to schedule the nursing staff. The problem involved meeting certain occupancy target levels while ensuring a minimum number and correct mix of available nurses.

Teleco Inc. (Teleco), an established telecom conglomerate with a significant position in the Canadian wireless business, had engaged M2 to plan its digital media spending strategy for the upcoming quarter. The vice-president at M2 would have to help Teleco decide on the ideal investment strategy for its $1.5 million digital media advertising budget and wondered how this would affect M2's strategic recommendations.