The configurator is one of the more difficult parts to evaluate in a CPQ-solution. The most straight forward way is probably to set up part of your real product rules in the CPQ system. However, this exercise is time consuming if you are evaluating multiple vendors. You are also likely to get questions from the vendors which in turn consume even more time.
It is not uncommon to try to solve this by instead giving the vendors a general problem and ask them to solve it. The
travelling salesman problem is one typical example, however these problems tend to be completely unrealistic and have almost no relation to real configuration problems.
Below is an example of a configuration task that can show you how the configurator works. The main complexity with this challenge are all the ‘or’ statements which are very common product rules problems, but that are difficult to solve with a simple configurator.
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Configuration task 1:
Variables:
- A: integer between 1 and 5
- B: integer between 1 and 5
- C: integer between 1 and 5
- D: integer between 1 and 5
- E: integer between 1 and 3
- F: integer between 1 and 9999
- G: integer between 1 and 9999
- H: integer between 1 and 20
Rules:
- Rule 1: A=2 requires D=4
- Rule 2: B=1 requires (A=1 and E=1) or (A=2 and E=1)
- Rule 3: C=1 requires (A=3 and B=2) or (A=4 and B=2)
- Rule 4: C=2 requires (A=3 and B=2) or (A=4 and B=2)
- Rule 5: C=3 requires (A=2 and B=1) or (A=3 and B=2)
- Rule 6: C=4 requires B!=4
- Rule 7: C=5 requires D=3 or D=4 or D=5
- Rule 8: A=2 requires G=1 or G=2
- Rule 9: D=3 requires F=3 or G=4
- Rule 10: A >= F
- Rule 11: E >= F + G
- Rule 12: H = A * B