Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1477844
SEPTEMBER 2022 I SMT007 MAGAZINE 33 working with our customers for alternates when they're avail- able so they can design them in quickly. We're also using brokers where we needed. If you talk to anyone in my position, I'm sure they've told you the same. It's an everyday battle to solve shortages. You get de-commits. As I've told my customers, you don't have the parts until they're on your dock. ere are heavyweight guys that have a lot of pull, so we make the strategic decision where there are parts that we know are high risk. We're working with our customers to help us cover where we need them to, but we won't make silly decisions and jeopardize our customers' requirements. We're very visible and vocal with our customers. Johnson: With all that complexity, did you have to start doing your job differently or use some different procedures? Lentz: Yes, in some cases. We have business intelligence, for example, to create some tools and reporting for us, streamlining our sys- tem reporting to get out to our suppliers. We use CalcuQuote as our quoting tool to check components at least six times a day. ey run our shortage list for us, looking for part availability. Our systems can't currently do that; we do not have an automated way. If you went back about five to seven years ago, it would be a buyer's full-time job, checking everyday availability. Now we're using some of our distributors to do that who can check it daily as an automated practice. CalcuQuote daily searches our global corporate preferred approved brokers. Johnson: How has that soware changed your procurement? You're getting more global vis- ibility, but what does that visibility mean for you when it comes to getting those parts? Lentz: It's almost like when a house goes on the market, and a day later it's sold. Parts become available, and the next day (or sooner) they're gone. We get a four-hour, six times a day check, all to my team in China. We want as much global coverage as possible, so we have the ability to grab stock as soon as it's avail- able. Eventually, we will work the APIs with them so that, hopefully, we can do some ERP integration here within Emer- ald. I'm hoping we can soon take advantage of their API capabilities with ShopCQ and some of the other things they offer. We use WatchCQ, and CalcuQuote to help us move our excess. It gives the conglomerate EMS providers and some OEMs the ability to look at availability of inventory and hopefully get some hits. I like CalcuQuote because they are very fluid as we suggest changes. For example, when WatchCQ was originally set up, you could only import one part at a time. I met with Chintan Sutaria, president of Calcu- Quote, and said, "It would be nice if we could upload a list." e next day, we had the abil- ity to upload a list and we put 150 parts up in a couple minutes. Historically, it was a more dif- ficult to get real-time changes with the quot- ing partners I had. is has been a huge help to us and we've had some good hits on those parts. ere were probably close to 20 parts hits on the list we had. It might not sound like a lot, but each one is huge for us. It could be revenue from a hundred thousand, to a mil- lion, or even $5 million. We're trying to get pre-approvals from our customers: If the price is up to 20% higher, we have their approval to buy it. Sometimes it would take customers up to two weeks to give us approvals. By that point, the parts are gone. Most of them now are good at 24 to 48 hours approval. Joe Garcia