CATLOC – Application Areas

CATLOC is the tool of choice for analysis driven cost management and LCC, for customers all over the world, in different industry sectors and for different types of systems – from battle ships, air defense systems and aero engines to metro trains, signaling systems and wind power farms.

Briefly described, CATLOC makes it possible to calculate, aggregate and analyze costs and revenues from all phases of the life cycle of a technical system. You can break down and distribute costs and revenues across different dimensions, and perform in-depth analysis to understand what drives costs and how cost and revenue are impacted by different decisions.

Here is a more detailed description of some of the most common application areas:

Life cycle cost analysis

Analysis of LCC (Life Cycle Cost) and TOC (Total Ownership Cost), in different phases and situations, is the primary application area for CATLOC. (The tool is however not restricted to costs, analysis of revenue and profits over the life cycle is just as easy and intuitive). Usually, the goal of LCC/TOC analysis is not to determine an exact number but rather to facilitate good decisions through making good and relevant estimates and compare different options from an economic perspective.

Already in early conceptual phases, CATLOC can be used in this way to predict how decisions about system designs, operations or support concepts affect costs over the system life cycle. Similarly, in the procurement and development and phases, decisions regarding requirement setting, tendering preparation (supplier), tender evaluation (buyer), negotiations, design changes and other major decisions can be supported by analyses of how they may impact life cycle costs. In subsequent phases, CATLOC continues to provide invaluable decision support during production, operations and maintenance, and termination phases, so that each major decision regarding the operations, the systems design or the support solution, can be based on a good understanding of how costs during the remaining system life cycle will be affected.

Since the cost structure and calculation formulas in CATLOC are  completely customizable, you can start with a simple, preliminary model based on default values, then gradually expand and refine the model with more details, formulas and parameters and increase the level of detail as the needs and data access change.

Continuous Improvement

In CATLOC, you decide entirely which costs to include in your analysis, how to break them down, how to distribute them across different dimensions, and what level of detail to use. This means an almost unlimited opportunity to scrutinize a solution and size different alternatives up against each other. One obvious use is to identify cost drivers or find the areas with the greatest potential for savings. Another use is to evaluate a proposed modification from a cost/benefit perspective.

Budgeting and planning

CATLOC is also the perfect tool for budgeting and forecasting costs and revenue to be expected given for example the planned operation and maintenance of a certain technical system during a certain time period. You might want to predict the total costs of a maintenance contract or understand how costs will be distributed across different departments during the next five years.

Sensitivity and risk analysis

The quick calculations and user friendly Analysis View in CATLOC makes it easy to examine how changes in the input data affect the total cost. CATLOC also features powerful support for identifying and quantifying uncertainty of estimated costs and revenue. Let one or more parameters vary according to any statistical distribution and analyze how this will impact results and risks. It is also possible to determine which parameters will have the greatest impact on costs, which cost types are affected when they vary, and by how much.

Cost/revenue analysis based on results from SIMLOX and OPUS10

CATLOC is a stand-alone tool, but is also an important component of the Opus Suite tool set. Input data and results from OPUS10 optimizations and SIMLOX simulations can be imported to CATLOC for comprehensive analysis of costs and revenue. It is even possible to “link” input data and results from OPUS10 and SIMLOX directly to CATLOC, so that the cost analyses will always use the latest data and the latest optimization/simulation results.