Frontline Systems, Excel Solver, optimization software, Solver Excel, simulation software
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From Frontline Systems, developers of the Excel Solver.

Solver tutorials

Learn to use optimization for resource allocation, and Monte Carlo simulation for risk analysis of your model.


 

Reduce Cost and Control Risk with Excel and our Solvers - Here's How

Yes, I Want to Reduce Costs and Control Risks -- But Can Your Solvers Help with My Problem?

Allocate Resources, Reduce Costs with Optimization

Optimization helps you make decisions to allocate scarce resources more efficiently.  The resources may be raw materials, machine time or people time, money, or anything else in limited supply. The "best" or optimal solution may mean maximizing profits, minimizing costs, or achieving the best possible quality.  See examples by functional area and industry.

If you're thinking "There's got to be a better way for us to do X [where X involves allocating resources].  But we have so many individual choices to make, and the possible combinations are almost infinite.  If we could do X more efficiently, the payoff would be terrific," then your problem is a good candidate for optimization.

How to do it?  You -- or a good analyst working for you -- will need to build a model that describes your resource allocation problem in quantitative terms, using decision variables, constraints, and an objective.  The fastest way to get results is to build the model in Microsoft Excel.  Our optimization Solvers can find the best of the many combinations -- and you can examine the solution in an Excel spreadsheet.

Understand and Control Risks with Simulation

Simulation helps you make decisions in situations with uncertainty.  The uncertainties may be interest rates or exchange rates, materials costs, competitors' prices, weather, or anything else that you can describe quantitatively, but you cannot control.  The results of a simulation give you insight into the range of possible outcomes, and what you can do to manage them.

If you're thinking "Why did that project turn out so badly?  We knew costs could be a little higher, sales could be a little lower, and some suppliers could be a little late --- but we didn't foresee what could happen if all those things happened at once," then your new project is a good candidate for Monte Carlo simulation.

How to do it?  You -- or a good analyst working for you -- will need to build a model that describes your situation, with each uncertain variable, and some quantification of the "size and shape" of each uncertainty.  Our simulation Solvers can automatically explore the full range of possible outcomes in seconds -- and you can examine the results in an Excel spreadsheet, with accompanying charts and graphs.

Decisions under Uncertainty: Using Both Methods

What if you need to allocate scarce resources in a situation with uncertainty?  You've definitely come to the right place -- we have the best software available anywhere for such problems.  Now the challenge is to find a robust optimal solution:  A way of allocating resources that maximizes profits or minimizes costs over the range of possible outcomes.

In many ways this is the sine qua non of business decision-making: most situations involve allocating resources, and most involve uncertainty.  But you'll be light-years ahead of most other decision-makers if you can do this with the aid of a good quantitative model:  Very few businesses are doing this now.

Building a good model is more work, since you have to specify decision variables, constraints, and an objective as well as quantified sources of uncertainty.  But our software, Risk Solver Platform, makes this process a lot easier than just about any other alternative.  Such models can be very difficult to solve -- but our software can apply the most powerful methods available to them.

What Makes Frontline's Solvers the Best Choice?

If your problem fits the descriptions above, and you're prepared to build an appropriate model, we believe our Solvers are the best choice you can find, anywhere in the world, even at prices many times higher than ours.  Why?

  • We are the technology source in this area for some of the world's largest software companies.  We developed both the Solver for optimization in Microsoft Excel, and the Extreme Speed feature - for high-speed simulation - in Oracle's Crystal Ball.  We have an 18-year history of technology "firsts" in this field.
  • Our advanced Solvers are proven in use by over 150,000 people.  We count nearly five thousand companies as customers, many of them Fortune 1000 and Global 2000 firms.  Our software is also the overwhelming favorite tool for teaching these methods to MBA students in a thousand universities worldwide.
  • More than any other vendor, we've made this technology easy to use by smart people who aren't specialists in "operations research" or "management science."  Beyond software, we have the experience to help you build a model and get results quickly -- in a full consulting capacity if needed, but more often in a "coaching" role for model-builders in your company.

How to Get Started with Our Solvers

The best way to see what our Solvers can do is to try them yourself -- free of charge.  Our premier tool, Risk Solver Platform, can take you all the way from a conventional "what-if" model in Excel, through conventional optimization (without uncertainty), Monte Carlo simulation, and optimization of an uncertain model to allocate scarce resources in a situation with uncertainty:

Register now! -- it's straightforward and free -- so you can:

  • Download a free 15-day Trial Version of Risk Solver Platform or any of our Excel Solver or SDK Solver products, whenever you're ready
  • Download our Solver User Guides -- take a close look at Risk Solver Platform, its subset products, and its capabilities for simulation and optimization
  • Access "protected" Tech Support pages and downloadable example models

Just enter your name and email address, pick the closest "User Type," and click the Register for Download button.  You can download immediately after registering, or return later anytime -- just login with your email address -- when you're ready to try out our Excel Solver upgrades.

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