Linear Programming: Equipment Replacement as Shortest Path with Excel Solver (Network Flows Part 5)

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Besides the obvious application of finding a shortest path for someone to travel from point A to point B, the shortest path model can be used for selecting the best equipment replacement strategy for a company. For example, imagine a large company that gives a computer to each employee. How often should the computers be replaced? Other businesses facing a simular problem are: car rental companies, construction equipment rental companies, music schools, etc.

[sebastianjorde]

Hello,
You are only looking at 1 particular optimization problem. Let’s say, I have thousands of assets which vary in purchase price, asset life time, depreciation, maintenance costs, costs to rebuild, etc. Now is there also a way to calculate the optimum to replace without the need to use a solver or if so, boil the problem down to run it with only a few solver runs and not several thousand?