Author Profile
Baucells, Manel
Roqueta Origen: Streamlining Wine Storage and Mixing (B)
Biggs, Max Baucells, Manel Alizamir, Saed
QA-0979 | Published August 26, 2024 | 7 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
This B case follows the A case “Roqueta Origen: Streamlining Wine Storage and Mixing (A)” (UVA-QA-0978). It resumes where the A case concluded and explores several different approaches for optimizing ... Read More
Roqueta Origen: Streamlining Wine Storage and Mixing (C)
Biggs, Max Baucells, Manel Alizamir, Saed
QA-0980 | Published August 26, 2024 | 2 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
This C case concludes the scenario introduced in the A case “Roqueta Origen: Streamlining Wine Storage and Mixing (A)” (UVA-QA-0978). The C case presents two final approaches to Roqueta Origen’s wine ... Read More
The 10th at Riviera
QA-0953 | Published September 19, 2023 | 9 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
This case presents a dilemma that professional golfers face when having to choose a target point for landing the ball. Key to this case is to acknowledge uncertainty as reflected in less-than-perfect ... Read More
Introduction to Dynamic Programming
QA-0955 | Published October 10, 2022 | 10 pages Technical Note
Collection: Darden School of Business
This technical note introduces dynamic programming (DP), a powerful tool for finding optimal solutions to complex problems that involve a concatenation of multiple decisions. This note assumes some fa... Read More
The Conundrum of Contingent Free Shipping
QA-0939 | Published February 28, 2022 | 2 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
This case uses the intent to make an online purchase of a clothing item to explore the role intuition may play in shopping decisions. Two criteria, price and quality, are identified as being important... Read More
Scheduling a Conference
QA-0925 | Published June 16, 2021 | 4 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
This case uses a mathematician’s experience as a first-time organizer for a prestigious conference in Barcelona, Spain, to set the stage for applying optimization methods to scheduling problems. In pa... Read More
Resolving Trade-Offs: From Simple Heuristics to Multicriteria Analysis
QA-0914 | Published December 18, 2020 | 10 pages Technical Note
Collection: Darden School of Business
This note discusses a variety of methods to assist intuition in complex situations with multiple objectives and a potentially large set of alternatives. It begins with heuristic rules, which are relat... Read More
CSR Bonus at CapTech
QA-0918 | Published October 12, 2020 | 3 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
This case follows Anisha Anderson, who has had three of her customer service representatives (CSRs) quit. Her job is to think about how she can adjust the CSR training and bonus program to promote ret... Read More
Tesla, Inc.: Supercharging Auto Sales
Baucells, Manel Maiden, Stephen E.
QA-0915 | Published June 10, 2020 | 14 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
This case describes the situation of Tesla, Inc. (Tesla), in mid-2019. Tesla had just successfully launched the more affordable Model 3, but sales of the most expensive and profitable Models X and S w... Read More
Tesla and the Future of Autonomous Driving
QA-0911 | Published May 28, 2019 | 3 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
An investor, Janice Zhuk, examines Tesla's quarterly safety data that includes the number of miles it took to register one accident among Tesla cars driving with autopilot versus those without autopil... Read More
Consumers' Mental Accounting
QA-0908 | Published December 17, 2018 | 6 pages Technical Note
Collection: Darden School of Business
When a consumer purchases an item, the presumption is that the benefit obtained from it exceeds the price paid—we can think of this difference as the consumer profit. How do consumers calculate this p... Read More
Updating Probabilities
QA-0860 | Published April 25, 2018 | 11 pages Technical Note
Collection: Darden School of Business
Individuals' judgement of probabilities—the likelihood of different events to occur, or the attribution of likely causes to what has occurred—is plagued by numerous biases and errors. This note focuse... Read More
Behavioral Time Discounting
QA-0896 | Published March 08, 2018 | 11 pages Technical Note
Collection: Darden School of Business
Many decisions involve trade-offs between present and future costs and benefits. We procrastinate difficult tasks, and we forgo larger rewards for smaller ones if we can get them sooner. Why do we cha... Read More
To LED or Not to LED?
QA-0862 | Published September 01, 2017 | 5 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
A director of marketing at a major big-box retailer in the United States finds herself overhearing a customer and a lighting specialist discuss the replacement of incandescent and halogen lightbulbs w... Read More
The Elevator Saga
QA-0866 | Published April 27, 2017 | 6 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
This case describes a common situation in old buildings, namely the decision as to whether intall an elevator. In this armchair case, we have an apartment building in Budapest with 3 towers, each cont... Read More
Behavioral Risk Preferences
QA-0858 | Published March 24, 2017 | 14 pages Technical Note
Collection: Darden School of Business
MBA students are taught to use the expected monetary value (EV) to evaluate risky opportunities. The reaction of individuals to risk, however, is far more complex. In fact, individuals are rarely foun... Read More
Vitaliy's Purchase Decision
Baucells, Manel Dydyshka, Vitaliy
QA-0861 | Published March 15, 2017 | 1 pages Exercise
Collection: Darden School of Business
This short case presents the trade-offs that Vitaliy faces before purchasing a car. The case contains a consequence table showing five different cars and how they fare on six attributes, including pri... Read More
Powerball: Somebody’s Gotta Win!
QA-0857 | Published March 01, 2017 | 6 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
The case evolves around the Powerball lottery and the rule changes implemented in 2015, which, among other things, changed the chances of winning the jackpot from 1 in 175 million to 1 in 292 million.... Read More
Preference for Sequences: Rock Loud and Proud Music Set List
QA-0856 | Published January 31, 2017 | 4 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
Numerous situations require sequencing objects. Several factors can be taken into account, such as creating contrast, avoiding satiation, satisfying impatience, or managing anticipation and recall. In... Read More
A GLUM Primer: The Risk-Adjusted Expected Value
Pfeifer, Phillip E. Bodily, Samuel E. Baucells, Manel
QA-0849 | Published August 11, 2016 | 9 pages Technical Note
Collection: Darden School of Business
The purpose of this note is to improve on the expected value criterion by incorporating a rational decision-maker's willingness and capability to take on risk. First, this note will review the concept... Read More
The Pelayo Family Plays Roulette
Bodily, Samuel E. Pfeifer, Phillip E. Baucells, Manel
QA-0850 | Published August 11, 2016 | 2 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
The Pelayo family has been studying roulette wheels and collecting data on tens of thousands of spins. Now the Pelayos have identified a wheel that they want to bet on, which has six numbers that have... Read More
The Pelayo Family Plays Roulette: The Prequel
Pfeifer, Phillip E. Bodily, Samuel E. Baucells, Manel
QA-0847 | Published June 20, 2016 | 1 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
The case presents data from 70,340 spins of four roulette wheels: three of which are real ("imperfect") and one of which is simulated ("perfect"). The challenge posed is to identify which of the four ... Read More
Roqueta Origen: Streamlining Wine Storage and Mixing (A)
Biggs, Max Baucells, Manel Alizamir, Saed Klopfenstein, Amy
QA-0978 | Published | 5 pages Case
Collection: Darden School of Business
This case examines an allocation problem at Roqueta Origen, a Spanish winery. A consultant must determine which batches of different wines to assign to tanks for maturation. As she considers which win... Read More