3 credits
Fall 2026 Lecture Upper Division
This course covers up-to-date and practical spreadsheet modeling tools that can be applied to a wide variety of business problems from finance, marketing, and operations. The topical coverage consists of the following five modules: (1) Excel functions, skills and financial models; (2) deterministic and stochastic optimization techniques to determine the best managerial actions under internally-and/or externally-imposed constraints; (3) probability distribution fitting techniques to find the most likely description of the uncertainty in future business; (4) simulation modeling techniques to discover and analyze the risk and uncertainties in business environment and processes; (5) application of spreadsheet modeling and simulation techniques in forecasting asset dynamics( stock price) and pricing options and real investment opportunities. This course provides hands-on experience of computer application using Microsoft Excel and the spreadsheet add-ins @RISK, RISKOptimizer, SimQuick, etc.
Learning Outcomes1Acquire advanced Excel skills to quickly build business spreadsheets that easily convey information and significance to the reader.
2Construct complex deterministic and stochastic computer models to aid in the decision making process.
3Use simulation modeling to identify and assess the risks in decisions and processes.
4Conduct financial analysis including asset and options pricing.
5Become skilled in the use of @RISK, RiskOptimizer, SolverTable, SimQuick and other software packages in making and analyzing business decisions.
Prerequisites
Restrictions
made by Purdue students.