You are working as a graduate within the engineering department of a manufacturing and consulting focused public listed company. You and your team are working on the post-COVID recovery and how best to allocate capital. Your team has $1,000,000 in capital at their disposal. The entire department is going to have a conference call next week and you have been asked to prepare a memo for the team regarding the financial options being considered. As the accounting department will be joining your memo is to prepare the staff for the call. The accountants are expected to use terms which may not be fully understood by the greater department. So your memo will be distributed before the call or you may be asked to speak on the call to assist everyone's understanding. The memo should discuss each of the following:

A new product line is also being proposed and it is expected that the accountants will discuss this option. Explain the difference between fixed and variable costs and state at least three examples of each that the company may incur.

Some employees have raised their concern that the new product line will not be profitable and that it will cost more to produce the new product than will be made. Explain the break-even point with particular focus on why a break even point is not immediate but rather is reached over time.