Four Steps You Can Take To Avoid Long Lead Times

Remember that mind-bogglingly huge shipping container that blocked the Suez Canal six weeks ago?  Yeah, that was just one link in the chain of The Great Semiconductor Shortage of 2020 and 2021. We are all feeling the pinch of its staggering ability to block almost $10 billion of goods a day and 400 other ships — for six long days in March.

Feeling The Chip Shortage? You're Not Alone.

As technology has advanced, semiconductor chips have spread from computers and cars to washing machines and dishwashers, and even toothbrushes. Chips now find their home in a surprisingly large number of products we use every day. And the demand for these chips has increasingly outpaced the supply. To make matters worse, many companies — particularly ones in countries with sanctions slapped on them — are stockpiling these chips to weather the storm.

The increased usage of semiconductor chips in a myriad of products we use in daily life, and the stockpiling of them by the companies and countries that make them, has created a ripple effect far and wide. But closer to home, we hear from our customers every day who are staring down a lead time of 8-10 weeks. One poor network engineer even reached out to our team this week because he was told his refresh would have a lead time of 120 (BUSINESS!) days. 

Understandably, this has engineers and directors asking us on the daily,   

"What the chip?! They said my gear is months out?! Can you help me get it faster?"

"What's with this extended lead time my OEM is telling me? I need my [you fill in the blank] NOW! Do you have it in your warehouse?"

Our answers: Yes. And Yes. So glad you asked.

Four Ways You Can Cut Down Your Lead Time

1. Nothing's more frustrating than being tied down by a $60 billion OEM who has a six-month lead time on the gear you need. To give you the creative options you need to run your IT ecosystem, PivIT has a large — like, $100 million large — inventory of legacy and current generation hardware immediately available, in stock, and with an operations crew who would jump at the chance to get it to you in 1-3 business days. Because we stock our PivIT shelves full of certified HPE, DellEMC, Cisco kit and past generation,  you could have that hole in your network plugged by Friday. Wouldn't that be nice?
   
   
2. Find a partner that has access to the finance and off-lease arms of all the OEMs you need. Your partner should have direct and immediate access to over $100M in inventory, both traditional refurbished equipment (Grade A, Lifetime Warranty), as well as Certified Overstock, Off Lease and Authorized Refurb options (OEM support included) from Dell, Cisco, HPE, Aruba, Juniper, etc.  
   
   
3. Be open to using refurbished equipment, short-term rental options, lease options, or even a company that can provide a creative Hardware as a Service Option that meets your needs with immediate availability. You want a VAR that has a complete offering of infrastructure - wireless, switch, server, telephony. And all of it delivered in a matter of days, not months - and always on your terms. 
   
   Pro Tip: Refurbished equipment can be a temporary band-aid while your new gear takes its sweet time getting to you. Or...you may find the 40-80% discount does wonders for your budget and that it's worth migrating strategic parts of your IT ecosystem to refurbished equipment. 
   
   
4. Talk to a Pre-Sales Engineer at PivIT to see what options you have. A Pre-Sales Engineer can take the 30,000-foot view of your ecosystem and show you creative ways to beat the ridiculous lead times. Or, they can take a deep dive into your projects and show you where to leverage a hybrid strategy to acquiring and maintaining your assets. Either way, you will get solutions that alleviate the pain caused by these lead times.

The Ever Given left a backlog of goods trying to get to ports around the world. But that's no reason for you to surrender your projects to The Great Semiconductor Shortage of 2020 and 2021. We're here to provide you with options that will help you beat the lead time battle.