The Market

Jacobs Industries' only product is an industrial chemical that can be mixed with air to form a foam that is:

Jacobs sells its chemical to manufacturers of air conditioner retrofit kits. The manufacturers are all located in the region of Calopeia. They purchase the foam chemical as a substitute for competitors' products. If Jacobs cannot ship an order within 24 hours of receiving the order from the customer, the customer makes its purchase from a competitor without any loss of future demand.

The chemical is shipped in small plastic drums at a price of $1450 a piece. Demand for the chemical is highly seasonal but otherwise very stable. There are no long-run market trends, either upward or downward. The size of orders is very random, with an average size of 7 or 8 drums. Orders arrive randomly throughout each 24-hour day.

It is now day 730, two years after Jacobs began producing and marketing the chemical. A new foam technology is in development at Jacobs that will render all production capacity and inventory of the current foam obsolete and worthless on day 1460. All customers are aware of the pending new technology and as a result, demand will decrease to zero on day 1460.