XYZ Company is a company involved in the industry of industrial coatings for applications in the chemical industry and is evaluating a project that will improve the quality of the WV8 coating. To this end, the company has determined that it will expand its production capacity with an investment project that will have a useful life of 15 years.

The project data is:

- The total initial investment is $145,925,000, which is made up of the following concepts: the development of the new WV8+ product, market research, the training plan to use the new operating technology of the WV8+ product, and conditioning of the new production line (rearrangement of the plant layout).

- $950.00 per year for the payment of rights of use of the new component that improves the WV8 product, during the 15 years, affected by inflation during the life of the product.

- The fixed expenses of the staff are $6,500,000 per year (considering salaries, social cost, etc.), with an increase of 0.5% per year on average from the third year of project operation and during the 15 years; also affected by inflation during the 15 years.

- Sales of the new product are estimated from market research at 15,600 tons (15,600,000 kilograms) the first year with an average annual increase of 5.5% for the next 5 years and then stabilize at an average annual growth of 1.5% the following following 9 years of project life.

- The estimated price per kilogram of product has been established at $8.75; this price is considered to be affected by inflation and an increase of 1% each year.

- Taxes for the company, due to its size and classification as a taxpayer, are set at 35% throughout the life of the project.

-To finance the project, the company has decided to request a loan from a bank that finances productive operations and sets soft rates for these projects to be paid in 10 years, starting from the first year, with annual payments of $9,947,889.99.

- The initial investment of the new WV8+ production line will be depreciated in a straight line over the life of the project.

- The new line of operation will require annual maintenance at a rate of $1,575,000 the first year and it is estimated that this cost will be affected from the second year of the project by inflation and by the 1.75% increase in costs of maintenance materials and for inflation.

- The unit cost of production is estimated at $5.85 per kilogram with an average decrease of 1.05% per year due to the experience in the use of the facility from the second year and affected by inflation for 15 years.

- Inflation is estimated to be 3.5% for the first 5 years of the project from 2016 and 4% for the rest of its life.

It is requested:

a) Calculate the NPV of the project for a rate of 17.12%

b) Calculate the TIR of the project.

c) Calculate the payback period of the project.