4 Jan
2010
4 Jan
'10
4:49 p.m.
On Jan 4, 2010, at 8:38 AM, William Donzelli wrote:
SKUs cost real $'s. And that's just to have it even if you never build one.
It's part of the process of having a trackable production system. Depending upon the
company this can be quite significant. Those are $'s that are part of the NRE and
have to be recouped in order to make a profit. When I was at IBM I think the oft quoted
number for a new part number (no part, no system, just adding and tracking the #) was
$50,000. Now think about how many parts are in a system (note that sub-assemblies have
their own part number). SKUs were more....much more.
Not to mention having to track multiple SKUs and do all of the testing which may need to
include agency tests (ie UL, FCC, etc). $$$$$'s.
TTFN - Guy
This kind of
thing makes me insane. I would have gladly paid another
$1, or even $10, had they just put the parts on the board.
Keep in mind that catering to the tiny majority of people like
yourself really throws a wrench in the manufacturing engineering
works. For every component of a computer there is the obvious cost of
the piece, but from there one can find *dozens* of little extra (and
sometimes not so little) costs associated with it - everything from
extra inventory costs to the extra toilet paper in the bathroom.
Having semicustom builds, like including the connectors in this
example,*really* amplifies things. I have a
hard time believing (i.e. prefer to believe) that this would be purely
a cost cutting move.
It is. All companies do it - even Apple and IBM and the other premium
equipment manufacturers. When you get into the trenches (the
production floor), you see that building computers is much more than
stuffing boards.