A company must choose between one of two machines- machine A has low fixed costs and high unit variable costs whereas machine 8 has high fixed costs and low unit variable costs . Consequently, machine A is most suited to low-level demand whereas machine 8 is suited to high-level demand . For simplicity assume that there are only two possible demand levels - low and high - and the estimated probability of each of these events is 0.5. The estimate profits for each demand level are as follows :

There is a possibility of employing a firm of market consultants who would be able to provide a perfect prediction of the actual demand . What is the maximum amount the company should be prepared to pay the consultants for the additional information?

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Low demand () High demand () Machine A 100000 160 000 Expected value () 130000 Machine B 10000 200 000 105 000