Sealed Bids vs Competitive Essay Example for Free

Sealed Bids vs Competitive Essay Sealed bidding and Competitive Proposals have their advantages and disadvantages for private contractors. The government offers the opportunity to contractors to place their bids depending on the specifics of the job or the contract requirements then the government will choose the channel which they will send the solicitation through. For Sealed Bidding is an Invitation for Bids and for Competitive Proposals bids are two ways of solicitation, a Request for Quotation and Request for Proposals (Murphy 2009). An advantage for contractors that are bidding through Sealed bidding is that they are not obligated to provide any information on cost or the profit to justify their bid price. The government has no control over that part and will have to rely solely on the price competition without having all the facts to know if the bid is a reasonable one. This can be a great advantage in making a higher profit if the contractor’s cost for the project is low. Another advantage is that there are no negotiations before, through the period of evaluation or after. There are no individual discussions with any bidder during the process, and no price discussions occur† (Murphy 2009, p. 18). Competitive Proposal advantages for contractors can occur when the government uses a tradeoff. Even though a tradeoff is used by the government when they feel it is to their benefit, it can also be advantageous for a contractor because if chosen the contractor once again does not have to be concerned with the cost or price and still be the one with the higher bid. This process permits tradeoffs among cost or price and noncost factors and allows the government to accept other than the lowest priced proposal† (Murphy 2009, p. 21). The difference with this approach is that the government can either arrange to have a discussion with the contractors or simply make their decision without holding a discussion. When the government chooses to hold a discussion they will select the proposals from those contractors that were in the competitive range. Then the government will have discussions with these contractors in which they can review their proposal, make adjustments and resubmit a new proposal. Although discussions are offered in some cases the government may opt to make their decision without a discussion or the change for contractors to review and change their bids (Murphy 2009, p. 21). The advantage would be for those contractors that were given the chance to make adjustments to their proposals which based on their discussion could be closer on making the final award. The two contracting methods have advantages for contractors but in my opinion the Sealed bidding is a less extensive process for both the government and the contractor. From the contractor’s perspective I would prefer the Sealed bidding for the fact that there are no extra requirements to prove costs and price.

Attacked by a Friend :: essays papers

Attacked by a Friend Long long time ago in a galaxy far far away. Really only four years ago on a Friday night in a small redneck town just west of Atlanta. We had just moved to a new home in the same city. My younger brother had a friend, whose name is Jason, spend the night at our new home. As the Friday evening wore on, I mostly stayed in my room on the internet. I did the best as I could to be as anti-social as I could. However, at last, all of the people I was talking to on CompuServe signed off and I was left all alone. Therefore, as hard as it was for me to go to my brother’s room and play with him and his friend, I did it. I had a blast. The night was actually turning out to be not so horrible. As the night wore on we continued to play, and then it happened. I swung at his face in a joking manner and with out realizing it, Jason had pulled out a knife and it had cut me. Instead of pain, I felt a surge of pressure being released and I knew what had happened was not good. As I felt the knife cut into my arm, I could see blood shoot across the room. Immediately I grabbed the cut on my arm and ran to the bathroom sink! Turning my head to yell at my brother I screamed, â€Å"Nathan, get the first aid kit!† The bleeding was not slow; it kept gushing out, with no control at all! Then Nathan returned. â€Å"Here you go!† He said as he handed the box to me. Turning my head to him I said, â€Å"That’s not going to work you idiot!† As I lifted my thumb from top of the wound more blood shot out and was stopped only by the wall. Now what do I do? Oh no! I am going to have to tell mom and dad! I am in so much trouble right now. So I told my parents and was taken to the emergency room in Douglasville, GA. When I first arrived to the ER we where told by the attendant to hold on, so I took my thumb off the cut for a second and when the woman saw that she let me in immediately.

Airbus Case Study

Airbus A3XX case study Group E10, MBA 2011 Airbus A3XX case study, Group E10 Airbus objectives Both Airbus and Boeing, as well as industry experts expected worldwide passenger traffic to grow at an average annual growth rate of 4. 8-4. 9% for the next 20 years (up until 2019). Given that the traffic was expected to almost triple in volume, both manufacturers expected a significant increase in aircraft sales, although their views on the market structure were different. Airbus expected hub-to-hub routes to become the dominant type of transportation in key regions (transatlantic and transpacific), opposing Boeing’s preference for point-topoint routes. Therefore, Airbus forecasted high growth rates in very large aircraft (VLA) segment, that was expected to reach 1,235 aircraft by 2019. Although Airbus had considerably increased its market share by 1999, it still did not have a product to compete with Boeing’s 747 in the highly-promising VLA market segment. Introduction of A3XX could help Airbus capture more than a half of this segment, and given the segment’s very positive prospects, it could position Airbus as the commercial aviation industry leader. FCF model The model estimates Airbus free cash flows associated with the potential implementation of A3XX project in 2001-2020. All calculations are performed in US dollars, net present value is calculated as of December 31, 2000. Given the uncertainty of model assumptions and the long-term nature of the model itself, additional sensitivity analysis was performed in respect of (a) operating margins, (b) discount rate, (c) inflation rate, (d) aircraft sales, (e) investment expenditure, and (f) sale price. Key assumptions Sales & production †¢ Sale price: $216m as of 2006, rising afterwards at the inflation rate. Although some of the first contracts are expected to be executed with a significant discount, this is not factored into the model due to low data availability. Operating margin: 15%, learning curve effect was ignored due to insufficient data (assuming lower margin in early years and higher margin at later stages — averaging at 15% over the forecasted period). †¢ Sales ramp-up: based on the assumptions used in Lehman Brothers equity research reports (25% of ‘steady state’ capacity in 1st year, 75% in the second year). †¢ Production capacity: 53 aircraft annually in â₠¬Ëœsteady state’ (based on a total sales estimate of 730-750 aircraft in 2001-2020). Pre-payments: although a fraction of the sale price is usually paid in advance, this factor was ignored due to insufficient data (all costs and payments are assumed to occur in the year when aircraft is delivered). -1- Airbus A3XX case study, Group E10 Funding & investments †¢ Funding: $11. 9b of quasi-equity, debt is not used in the project. †¢ Launch costs: $11. 0b for research & development, $1. 0 for capital expenditures, $1. 0b for additional working capital (as per Dresdner Kleinwort report). †¢ Additional capital expenditures: assumed at zero after the investment stage (20012008) is over †¢ Discount rate: 11. % as cost of equity (CAPM = 6. 0% risk-free rate + 0. 84 commercial aviation beta * 6% market risk premium). †¢ Depreciation: straight line over 10 years, starts immediately after corresponding capital expenditures are performed. †¢ R&D expenses are n ot capitalised. Other †¢ Inflation: constant at 2. 0%. †¢ Tax rate: 38. 0% (standard French rate). †¢ Terminal value: growing perpetuity where growth is set at the rate of inflation. †¢ Boeing’s response to A3XX launch is not explicitly modelled (assuming this factor is already taken into account through unit sales and margins). Although the market demonstrates considerable cyclicality, this factor was ignored for the sake of simplicity. Modelling results Net present value of the A3XX project is estimated at $528m, consisting of ($1,447m) NPV of 2001-2020 cash flows and $1,975m of terminal value. The break-even number of planes after the investment stage (in 2009 and beyond) is estimated at 48 per year. In this case the NPV of growing perpetuity is expected at $4,702m (annual inflows of $1,061 growing at 2% with 11% discount rate), while the NPV of cash flows in 2001-2009 is estimated at ($4,552). Sensitivity analysis The following tables present bi-dimensional sensitivity analysis of the resulting NPV for model variables that have significant predictability issues and / or likely to cause huge changes in the resulting NPV: -2- Airbus A3XX case study, Group E10 Project launch considerations Implementation of the A3XX project definitely has a very high risk profile. Although the resulting NPV figure is positive under the base scenario, sensitivity analysis indicates that returns on this project are extremely sensitive to the underlying model assumptions (e. g. a drop in operating margin by just 2 percentage points results in negative NPV). Therefore, there is a high risk of negative returns on this project. The project’s profitability may also be undermined by external market factors. The most crucial ones being (a) the response of Boeing to A3XX project launch, (b) growth rate of the VLA market. However, this project is strategically important for Airbus. Over the last several decades, since the introduction of Boeing 747 the share of VLA segment has expanded significantly. Additionally, analysts estimate VLA manufacturing has the highest operating margins — that is commonly used to subsidise production of smaller aircraft. However Airbus is not present in this segment at this time. Therefore, despite a very high-risk profile of the project, Airbus has good reasons to proceed with this industrial launch. It it difficult to estimate the number of firm orders Airbus needs to have before committing to the project. The financial model suggests it needs to sell 300+ aircraft before cumulative non-discounted project cash flow becomes positive. However, taking into account the fact that airlines do not place orders with delivery time exceeding 5-6 years, it is highly unlikely that Airbus secures orders for 300+ planes before project launch. A significant amount of orders (e. g. 50+) is likely to be enough to test Airbus demand forecasts. Potential Boeing response Although Boeing’s estimations of the VLA market are not so optimistic as Airbus’, it should definitely take some actions to defend its dominant position on this market. Boeing is unlikely to undertake a similar development project (i. e. develop a new plane for the VLA segment), since it would be a lose-lose strategy for both companies given limited size of this market segment. Therefore, the most obvious decision for Boeing would be to invest in the ‘stretch’ version of its 747 model. This is likely to take significant amount of orders away from Airbus while keeping the investment costs low. In case Airbus decides not to go ahead with its A3XX project, Boeing has no incentive to incur any investment costs whatsoever, since it already has established presence in the VLA segment with its 747 aircraft. -3- Airbus A3XX case study, Group E10 Financial projections (in US$ mln) 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 Revenue Operating pro? t R&D expenses Depreciation EBIT Taxes EBIAT – – – – – 2,808 421 -880 -100 -559 212 -771 8,813 11,910 12,149 12,392 12,640 12,892 13,150 13,413 13,681 13,955 14,234 14,519 14,809 15,105 1,322 -660 -100 562 -214 775 1,787 -440 -100 1,247 -474 1,720 1,822 -100 1,722 -654 2,377 1,859 -100 1,759 -668 2,427 1,896 -100 1,796 -682 2,478 1,934 -75 1,859 -706 2,565 1,973 -40 1,933 -734 2,667 2,012 -5 2,007 -763 2,770 2,052 2,052 -780 2,832 2,093 2,093 -795 2,889 2,135 2,135 -811 2,946 2,178 2,178 -828 3,005 2,221 2,221 -844 3,066 2,266 2,266 -861 3,127 1,100 -2,200 -2,200 -2,200 -1,320 -25 -60 -95 -100 -1,100 -2,225 -2,260 -2,295 -1,420 418 846 859 872 540 -1,518 -3,071 -3,119 -3,167 -1,960 R&D expenses Capital expenditure Net working capital Operating pro? t Taxes Free cash ? ow Discounted FCF -1,100 -2,200 -2,200 -2,200 -1,320 418 -250 -150 846 -350 -300 859 -350 -300 872 -50 -200 540 -880 -50 421 212 -296 -158 -660 1,322 -214 448 21 6 -440 1,787 -474 873 379 1,822 -654 1,168 457 ,859 -668 1,190 419 1,896 -682 1,213 385 1,934 -706 1,227 351 1,973 -734 1,238 319 2,012 -763 1,249 290 2,052 -780 1,272 266 2,093 -795 1,298 244 2,135 -811 1,324 225 2,178 -828 1,350 206 2,221 -844 1,377 190 2,266 -861 1,405 174 -682 -1,755 -1,991 -1,978 -1,030 -614 -1,424 -1,456 -1,303 -611 Aircraft sale price Aircraft sold 216 13 220 40 225 53 229 53 234 53 238 53 243 53 248 53 253 53 258 53 263 53 269 53 274 53 279 53 285 53 -4-

Understanding Iridium Flares

Our night skies are packed full of stars and planets to observe on a dark night. However, there are more objects closer to home that observers plan on seeing every so often. These include the International Space Station (ISS) and numerous satellites. The ISS appears as a slow-moving high-altitude craft during its crossings. Many people often mistake it for a very high-flying jet. Most satellites look like dimmer points of light moving against the backdrop of stars. Some satellites appear to move east to west, while others are in polar orbits (moving nearly north-south). They generally take a little longer to cross the sky than the ISS does. A pair of Iridium satellites flaring. Jupiter is to the right and the bright star Arcturus is to the lower left. Jud McCranie, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0. There are thousands of artificial satellites around Earth, in addition to thousands of other objects such as rockets, reactor cores, and pieces of space debris (sometimes referred to as space junk). Not all of them can be seen with the naked eye. Theres a whole collection of objects called Iridium satellites that can look very bright during certain times of day and night. Glints of sunlight bouncing from them are referred to as Iridium flares and for years they have been observed fairly easily. Many people probably have seen an iridium flare and simply not known what they were looking at. It also turns out that other satellites can show these glints, although most are not as bright as the iridium flares. Whats Iridium? Satellite phone or pager users are major users of the Iridium satellite constellation. The constellation is a set of 66 orbiting stations that provide global telecommunications coverage. They follow highly inclined orbits, which means that their paths around the planet are close to (but not quite) from pole to pole. Their orbits are roughly 100 minutes long and each satellite can link to three others in the constellation. The first  Iridium  satellites were planned to be launched as a set of 77. The name Iridium comes from the element iridium, which is number 77 in the periodic table of the elements. It turns out that 77 were not needed. Today, the constellation is used largely by the military, as well as other clients in the airline and air traffic control communities. Each  Iridium  satellite has a spacecraft bus, solar panels, and a set of antennae. The first generations of these satellites go around Earth in roughly 100-minute orbits at a speed of 27,000 kilometers per ho ur. The History of Iridium Satellites Satellites have been orbiting Earth since the late 1950s when  Sputnik 1  was launched. It soon became obvious that having telecommunication stations in low-Earth orbit would make long-distance communications much easier and so countries began launching their own satellites in the 1960s. Eventually, companies got involved, including the Iridium Communications corporation. Its founders came up with the idea of a constellation of stations in orbit in the 1990s. After the company struggled to find customers and eventually went bankrupt, the constellation is still in operation today and its current owners are planning a new generation of satellites to replacing the aging fleet. Some of the new satellites, called Iridium NEXT, have already been launched aboard SpaceX rockets and more will be sent to space to orbits that will likely not produce as many flares as the older generation has. What Is an Iridium Flare?   As each Iridium satellite orbits the planet, it has a chance to reflect sunlight toward Earth from its triad of antennae. That flash of light as seen from Earth is called an Iridium flare. It looks very much like a meteor flashing through the air very rapidly. These brilliant events can happen up to four times a night and can get as bright as -8 magnitude. At that brightness, they can be spotted in the daytime, although its much easier to see them at night or in twilight. Observers can often spot the satellites themselves crossing the sky, just as they would any other satellite. Looking for an Iridium Flare It turns out that Iridium flares can be predicted. This is because the satellite orbits are well known. The best way to find out when to see one to use a site called  Heavens Above, which keeps track of many known bright satellites, including the Iridium constellation. Simply enter your location and get a feel for when you might see a flare and where to look for it in the sky. The website will give the time, brightness, location in the sky, and length of the flare for as long as they continue to occur. Saying Goodbye to Iridium Flares Over the next few years, many of the low-orbiting Iridium satellites that have been reliably producing flares will be decommissioned. The next generation of satellites wont be producing such flares as reliably as the old ones did due to their orbital configurations. So, it may be that Iridium flares could become a thing of the past. Fast Facts Iridium flares are caused by sunlight glinting from the surfades of low-orbiting Iridium satellites.Such flares can be very bright and last only a few seconds.As new generations of Iridium satellites are being put into higher orbits, Iridium flares may become a thing of the past.