You all know your hungry monster in your company, don’t you?

It is called “production”, and it needs food (=electronic components) day and night, usually 24/7. 

Plus it is a well known fact, that you can NOT build a complex electronic device, if one cheap component is missing, such as simple operational amplifier.

Well, there is another monster, which is not as hungry as production, but maybe a bit more impatient. It is called “Engineering samples”. We often oversee it, but: same fact: if you do not have ALL components together, device cannot be built, the entire NPI process is delayed and as a matter of fact, the release of the new geeky device from your company comes to market later, means: profit is being generated later.

I know this never happens in your company (quick laughter… now let’s continue…).  However, if it does:

What can you do to mitigate this.

The first thing always is to have:

• A solid AMPL (=Approved manufacturers part list), multi sourced.

Means: for each company part number, there has to be a 100% correct manufacturer part number specified by engineering. And, I correct myself:  there has to be MORE than one manufacturer part number, which is called multi-sourcing. Multi sourcing gives the sourcing folks the option to purchase from company B as a plan B, if company A cannot deliver.

The second thing to have is:

• A reliable, big supplier, that can deliver parts fast.

Might it be parts not available in the market right now, or might it be parts being obsolete already. Even if the part is no longer on the market, purchasing those from your “distributor for special cases” can be a very good idea, for the simple reason: This buys you time to perform a redesign throwing out the obsolete component, which might take between a month and a year, depending on the kind of part or on the standards and approvals your finished good has to comply with.

My recommendation for such a distributor

              WIN-SOURCE.NET – simply as they have a wide range of components on stock. Give them a try next time you have a production stop or a delay in building engineering samples.

Talking on the price:

• Yes, those are expensive. Sometimes much more expensive than your big distributors you purchase your components from under normal conditions.  BUT: think about the financial impact if your sales people cannot sell. Ask Marketing how many of your customers are willing to wait and how many will go to competition immediately.  In other words: Paying double for a 1$ operational amplifier is a pain – but seeing an order of a couple of 1.000$ devices being cancelled because your monster wasn’t satisfied is a so much bigger pain.

For engineering samples, the loss is similar, but not that obvious. So, let us think about it: The release of a new device is delayed by just 2 weeks. Consequence: you will miss the revenue of 2 weeks in the year of release. Well, you know better than me what your planned annual revenue of this new device will be, so you can do the math yourself, and quickly realize that getting a component from stock (for a high price), might be the much better solution financially spoken.

Takeaway

Take care of your monsters. Feed them fast and with everything they want.

Consider Win-Source.net to get your parts in trouble.

Do not only think on the more of money in purchasing, consider the much bigger gain you will have in doing it.

Last not least: Let me help you. Just call.  Volker from VECE-consulting.com