Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
Supply Chain/Purchasing
Knowingwhichpartsandhowmanyofthemyouwillneed—informationthatisoftenover-
looked in the early stages of product development—is most critical to ensuring success in
getting your idea to market. Not only is a firm BOM list crucial, but knowing where you
will be buying those parts from is of equal importance, if not more so.
Establishing your own supply network is a great deal easier these days thanks to inter-
national online marketplaces like Alibaba.com, and many others like it. However, even
Alibaba does not fully encompass all of the options out there for sourcing the parts and
materials needed to manufacture your design. As anyone attempting to set up a
supply
chain
quickly learns that nothing can replace pure persistence and perseverance in the
hunt for component sources. However, that effort to dig deeper and deeper into the range
of possibilities is sure to eventually deliver competitive benefits when the suppliers with
the best
quality-price matrix
are discovered. Put simply: who can deliver the highest-
quality parts, on time, at the best price?
Diversification in your supply chain will benefit you greatly. Inevitably, one of your
vendors, at one point or another, will
not
have the quantity of some component you need,
when you need it. Do not overestimate the value in having a secondary supplier already
vetted and in your back pocket should you need to have that component in your hands at a
moment's notice. You will likely pay more per piece for those parts, although only you
can determine the lost opportunity cost incurred by not getting your hands on those parts.
SparkFun has typically sourced its proprietary, non-substitute parts from distributors
such as Future Electronics, Digikey, Mouser, and Arrow, all of which have North Americ-
an sales offices and warehouses. Microcontrollers from Atmel, Texas Instruments, or Mi-
crochip fall in this category, as do most of the passive components used in SparkFun's
designs like capacitors, resistors, buzzers, and sensors. The parts hunting experts at
SparkFun have enjoyed considerable success in finding international (and lower-cost)
sources for such components as LEDs, displays, batteries, and connectors. The tradeoff in
buying from these lower-cost suppliers is that SparkFun often has to keep a larger amount
on its inventory shelves because the lead times from those suppliers often greatly exceeds
those of the domestic suppliers.
Before the MaKey MaKey Kickstarter campaign went live, SparkFun had already be-
gun ordering additional inventory so that it would have the greatest chance for success in
building up the anticipated 300-400 boards and kits by the August deadline. However, by
the time the Kickstarter campaign was only 72 hours old, it was already clear that
SparkFun would be tasked with building far more than 300-400 circuit boards and kits.
This realization quickly triggered a revision of the forecasted demand so that component
suppliers could be contacted as soon as possible to increase the requested quantities of the
