Abstract. Sandwich panels with thin metal sheets and a thick, anisotropic foam core are considered in the paper. While the experiments show a large anisotropy of core's material, this factor is usually neglected due to elementary assemble of sandwich panels and basically simple boundary conditions. In this paper the problem of rectangular openings is considered. Thus, the influence of two main factors on the response of modelled panels are analysed, mainly: the material model of the PU foam core and openings existing in the panel. Sensitivity analysis with respect to these factors is presented. In the final part of the paper, the conclusions are formulated.