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The team from Force Technologies will be discussing all things obsolescence amongst themselves and with a mix of special guests from the industry.
00:00:16:19 - 00:00:38:18
Charlotte
Hi and welcome back to another episode of Force Tech Talk. Now, you might notice it looks a little bit busy today. We're trying out a new format. So bear with us. It may work. It may not. But from the previous podcast, we've got a few questions that always get sent in and we thought we'd get a few of us together.
00:00:38:21 - 00:00:46:27
Charlotte
Kind of potluck, throw them in a bag, pull them out and throw them to whoever we think is best to to answer it. So, it.
00:00:46:27 - 00:00:47:27
Karen
Should be scary if.
00:00:47:27 - 00:00:59:08
Charlotte
Everybody's up for it. We'll go from there. Go for it. So I get that. Obviously it's a force branded bag. It's got to be.
00:00:59:11 - 00:01:07:18
Charlotte
Okay, so why do suppliers give very short or unclear end of life notices? Let's do that, Carl.
00:01:07:18 - 00:01:28:17
Karen
I can do that. I think it's I think things have changed over the last few years. Things have changed. Notices are getting shorter. In the good old days. When I started in the industry, the semiconductor industry was a lot more stable. There was a lot more planning going on. There was a lot more factories in the world.
00:01:28:24 - 00:01:51:09
Karen
There was a lot more manufacturers. I think as the as a as ever, it's been brought over and merges and this has been bought and this has been bought. There's a lot of, mergers and then that people decide on manufacturers are they're not going to make that chip. And it literally is a six month decision. And then they would sometimes take the factories down.
00:01:51:11 - 00:02:06:26
Karen
I think also, there's been a little problem and I'm not looking distribution here. And I'm sure we're going to get a lot of feedback for this, but sometimes distribution, don't act the quickest they could do. They get the last time buys in from their, from their franchises, and it takes a little while to filter through the system.
00:02:06:28 - 00:02:23:28
Karen
I know many years ago in, in the market for so many years ago because you were all young. But, in the defense industry, a lot of the big guys and I won't name names, only kept records for five years. So if you were in the defense industry and you've been using this part ten years ago and hadn't used it for a while, you never got told anyway.
00:02:24:00 - 00:02:43:27
Karen
And it wasn't crazy. Yeah. And it wasn't until the very last minute that you realize you needed the goods and you rang the distributor and said, oh, no, the last time was gone. And also the other thing is it's a kind of a little bit testing, you know, the manufacturers test whether or not it's worth making the support and of life because what they need is the orders.
00:02:43:29 - 00:02:56:15
Karen
So they make the notice out and see how many orders they get in, and then they decide whether or not, oh, God, actually, people do use this part. We'll just keep making it and then they change their minds. So that's my take on it.
00:02:56:17 - 00:03:03:26
Charlotte
Okay. Alrighty.
00:03:03:28 - 00:03:12:23
Charlotte
What are the biggest engineering mistakes made when reacting to obsolescence under time pressure engineering? And when.
00:03:12:24 - 00:03:13:02
Eder
This.
00:03:13:02 - 00:03:15:03
Charlotte
Question is what.
00:03:15:06 - 00:03:47:10
Ben
Is mistakes? I mean, sort of. I think it's snap decisions. Sadly, from what we've seen in terms of I guess, I guess the biggest risk is, you know, counterfeit. I mean, if you if you've, you're screaming car parts, you've got multi-million pound dollar projects sitting there that you need to get out and moving. And you've got an in-built quality, you know, standard that you work to meet, some customers sort of was the only buy from franchise.
00:03:47:10 - 00:04:13:09
Ben
And that's a hard and fast rule. And then they then they start having to deviate from that, and go out to non franchised sources. That's when you, you know, you do run the risk of getting counterfeits onto your systems, or spending a large amount of money buying, buying components. And and then any other there any other risks that I can sort of, think is that.
00:04:13:09 - 00:04:39:05
Ben
Yeah. You just you just rush something through. You don't you don't think it through. Maybe you move to an alternative part that doesn't get qualified and approved correctly. You try and skip a qualification step, you know, and just try and sort of qualify the end board rather than sort of. Yeah. Making sure that the, the individual semiconductor itself is, is meeting your relevant quality standards and qualification standards.
00:04:39:08 - 00:04:40:10
Ben
00:04:40:13 - 00:04:41:05
Karen
Yeah.
00:04:41:07 - 00:04:57:16
Ben
But it's just pressure, you know. Yeah. It's, it's, you know, it's the standard thing. You know, you get project managers putting a huge amount of pressure on, engineering and assembly to, to get stuff done and buyers and, and it just, you know, it flows downhill doesn't that. So sort of.
00:04:57:18 - 00:05:02:01
Charlotte
Yeah. It's the classic when do you need this. Yesterday. Yeah. Oh yeah.
00:05:02:03 - 00:05:07:17
Karen
That's what we're always asking to like when it comes to yesterday.
00:05:07:19 - 00:05:14:05
Charlotte
We missed the last time by notice. What options do I have. That's one for.
00:05:14:05 - 00:05:15:07
Karen
You. That's enough.
00:05:15:09 - 00:05:36:28
Charlotte
Yeah. I mean, missing the last time by notice. We have heard it happen. I think, like you say, if it goes through distribution and people on keeping on top of that themselves, they're relying on kind of third parties or platforms to do that. Then it it can get missed. And we have had that happen. I'd say engage with your approved supply chain.
00:05:36:28 - 00:05:58:03
Charlotte
Don't deviate like we were just discussing. Engage with solution providers that can if they're not the ones providing a solution, they can at least guide you in the right way, maybe kind of act in a bit of a consulting consulting way. You will likely have options. I think that's the thing. People panic, they see. Oh my God, we missed it.
00:05:58:06 - 00:06:04:13
Charlotte
You know, redesign or go out to the great market and buy something that's. Yeah, it's it's a bit dicey.
00:06:04:15 - 00:06:23:21
Ben
I mean, if it's just been made obsolete, or end of life. Then there's probably some stock floating around there. The end. But then, you know, you're probably competing with multiple other companies. If, you know, if an OEM is not been putting out good end of life notifications or that kind of thing, or you just happen to have missed it, then you're competing against every other companies.
00:06:23:21 - 00:06:44:06
Ben
Dun dun, same, and you're going to get gouged on the market by distributors if you don't see it, you know, understandably so. See that there's a couple of thousand pieces left and and the prices at times tens. And then some. Yeah. Some ones are really stuck. So yeah. But I mean that if you come by and bank some material.
00:06:44:08 - 00:07:04:02
Karen
That's what blockchain isn't it. I mean, we've talked about this before. You need to get close to you supply chain. You need to have supplier assurance. And I've spoken about this many times because yeah, if you start trolling the world for the last lot of stock, all it does is just price up. Yeah, it just makes sense what you're doing.
00:07:04:05 - 00:07:07:18
Karen
And and it doesn't help the market. It doesn't help the semiconductor market or.
00:07:07:19 - 00:07:09:26
Ben
No. That's right. No.
00:07:09:28 - 00:07:25:13
Charlotte
Yeah. There are generally always options is is rubbish if you miss it. But there are there are options. What is the difference. This is a we get this one of the time. What is the difference between a form for a function and a 1 to 1 replacement.
00:07:25:15 - 00:08:09:00
Ben
Yeah. The the form fit functions generally some things. So like for example if we're doing a for a devices would be classified as a form fit function. Because it meets all the dimensional requirements to get onto the customer's PCP, it meets either 100% or 99% of the electrical parameters, or it's, has slightly better performance of the customers making, you know, making decisions there so needs to be reviewed, qualified, a sort of 1 to 1 or absolute direct would be, you know, in cases like the original five, nine, six to DC numbers where you've got, you know, 4 or 5 different manufacturers who are qualified on the original.
00:08:09:02 - 00:08:27:23
Ben
Part drawing. So you know that you can freely take another one of those. So if you can't get order, you can't get the original amount, one that was on there you might be able to get, you know, but, I am the replacement or the signing cycle replacement or something along those lines where it's it's pre-qualified.
00:08:27:23 - 00:08:41:08
Ben
They all meet the same overarching drawing. You know, that you can just order it as a slightly different number, but it's on the same overall overall spec. And, you know, you can just drop that in as long as you've got the relevant traceability standards for buying that material.
00:08:41:11 - 00:08:45:02
Karen
That's what I'm saying. Just be one DC number. The different manufacturer.
00:08:45:03 - 00:09:03:18
Ben
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you'll be buying into that. But I mean it's the then the overall sort of, you know you can even buy as the IBM part. Alongside that because you know, you know if you buy now, a memory device from my manufacturer, but they're all, you know, and there's another memory that's the manufacturer on the original five, nine, six, two.
00:09:03:18 - 00:09:17:15
Ben
Or you could even order as the original OEM part number and know that it's going to be a close, you know, identical functional, replacement in terms of how it performs on the board. So, yeah.
00:09:17:18 - 00:09:17:27
Charlotte
I guess.
00:09:17:27 - 00:09:20:07
Karen
A good question, as customers keep sending us.
00:09:20:07 - 00:09:42:28
Charlotte
As customers, people to watch the podcast is, yeah, it's we really appreciate the questions if please keep sending them in, how an ad is going to love this. How do I balance just in time principles with the reality of a platform with a long lifecycle insistence that include components that go obsolete quickly, just in time?
00:09:43:00 - 00:10:13:09
Eder
Yeah, I'll focus on just in time. It's longer than any year since I started working for Force Technologies, and I had to adapt my brain, my thinking way, to our reality. And I know that it's impossible to consider adjusting time. Consider a lean system because those of the systems our customers have, they are 30 years old. So we cannot consider they will do, by what you need.
00:10:13:15 - 00:10:45:15
Eder
They invest by things that they need to survive to keep so they can survive or make the system survive for another 30 years. So just in time, is is impossible through the whole system. What we try to do at Force Technologies is keeping our systems smart enough, efficient enough so we can react straight away when they come to locking our doors, desperate for parts, and we can deliver the best quality at the best time and very competitive, cost as well.
00:10:45:15 - 00:10:46:22
Eder
So that's our focus.
00:10:46:23 - 00:10:57:04
Karen
That's why we're doing the storage isn't I mean, that's why we're investing all this money in storage, because we will get to a point where we could do just in time on the standard products, because we've got the Di, the we'll have the packages that we.
00:10:57:04 - 00:10:57:18
Charlotte
Definitely.
00:10:57:18 - 00:11:10:26
Karen
Had on, you know, our manufacturing assembly is about, I think 6 to 8 weeks, you know, tops. So we will get to a point eventually, that we can do that and we, you know, we right. We're not there just yet, but.
00:11:10:26 - 00:11:11:12
Eder
We.
00:11:11:14 - 00:11:14:00
Karen
Can we will do. We're working very hard to get that. Yeah.
00:11:14:03 - 00:11:23:29
Eder
The efficiency is the word for, for me. Try to make our system, efficient enough to react as soon as possible and deliver the best service to our customers.
00:11:24:01 - 00:11:48:00
Ben
So, I mean, I guess in our market, in the best, the cleanest the customer could be is having a really good idea of their forecasts, because as they know they're going to use 2000 over the next ten years, minimum. Then then they can at least buy that in store, you know, and get it at the best price, lock it in early and then so they're not, you know, five, ten years down the line dealing with price increases and things like that.
00:11:48:00 - 00:12:12:00
Charlotte
So yeah so like recently like some of the discussions I've had with some customers, I don't know if it's just because we've worked with them for so long that they, they know the kind of information that, that we would need to provide them with the best product, the best service. But I feel like recently, if we ask the customer, okay, what's your EU or what's your, what's your quantity over the annual period and how long some of them are coming back really kind of quickly and like this is it.
00:12:12:02 - 00:12:24:17
Charlotte
Where is it used to be. Oh I don't know. We'd have to check. We'd have to ask the customer. But it feels like recently there's a couple of projects that spring to mind where they really they just know what it is. And it's. Yeah, it's very helpful really.
00:12:24:19 - 00:12:33:17
Karen
Hand you've had a customer who, you know, they're going to need more and, you know, they flatly say, no, we just need this. So we've taken the chance and bought the die.
00:12:33:17 - 00:12:35:01
Charlotte
Anyway I know.
00:12:35:02 - 00:12:38:23
Karen
So the die is sitting there not because they wanted to stay, but because we know.
00:12:38:27 - 00:12:39:10
Charlotte
We knew.
00:12:39:11 - 00:12:43:29
Karen
They would know they're going to need it. So, yeah, I mean, we do that quite a lot.
00:12:43:29 - 00:13:00:25
Charlotte
Yeah, it's a dance. It's always a dance. Yeah. It's like, you know, you know, you're going to need it. You know, you're going to need a bit of your system saying no and you ain't customer saying no. Then you can't cut. They can't. But sometimes it. Yeah. A lot of times I think, yeah, we're going to have to do another one of these because I feel like we have more questions.
00:13:01:01 - 00:13:07:22
Charlotte
Okay. Yeah. But yeah. Thank you. Hopefully the format worked. But thank you for tuning in and we'll do another one. Stay tuned.