RFQ

[moby]

On Jan 30, 8:49 pm, "Jim Butler" <jbutl...@sw.rr.com> wrote:

This may seem like a stupid question, but I've been wondering this for quite
a while now, and I hope someone here can help me answer this:
When you go looking on the web for a source to purchase some part, and you
can't find it in any of the usual vendor's catalogues (i.e. Digikey, Newark,
etc.) and you do a web search for it, invariably you will get lots of links
to pages for you to submit a Request For Quote. Now here is the question:
How in the world are you supposed to know what price range should seem
reasonable for a part (any part) when 1) you can't find any reference prices
from any competitors anywhere on the net, and 2) the firm that you are
trying to get a quote from does not offer you any clue as to what kind of
price range they are looking for in their parts?

Googling for parts is fraught with hazards, once you get outside the
well known
suppliers. Something that always pops up is "Hong Kong Inventory", and
from
the number of responses you get back, sometimes I think the entire
Shenzen district
is infested with backyard chip brokers. It works like this : you
submit an RFQ for, say
a few hundred ABC1234 chips and give a target price (well below what
you would pay
a reputable disty like Newark or Digikey). Within hours, half of China
was filled your mailbox
with offerings, often with a 10:1 price ratio between top and bottom.
You choose one
then enter into negotiation. After this, they issue a proforma invoice
which, 75% of the
time, has a price HIGHER than what they quoted. When you question
this, the reply is
"demand has increased", even though you are the one who has generated
the demand.
They dont do credit cards, need bank drafts, inflate the shipping and
even then, sometimes
you get a helluva bargain. Other times you get little bits of plastic
that look like chips but
do nothing at all (I got caught out with a bunch of dummy AL3201s this
way).
There be dragons......
M

 

[Spehro Pefhany]

On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 01:49:38 -0600, the renowned "Jim Butler"
<jbutler9@sw.rr.com> wrote:

This may seem like a stupid question, but I've been wondering this for quite
a while now, and I hope someone here can help me answer this:
When you go looking on the web for a source to purchase some part, and you
can't find it in any of the usual vendor's catalogues (i.e. Digikey, Newark,
etc.) and you do a web search for it, invariably you will get lots of links
to pages for you to submit a Request For Quote. Now here is the question:
How in the world are you supposed to know what price range should seem
reasonable for a part (any part) when 1) you can't find any reference prices
from any competitors anywhere on the net, and 2) the firm that you are
trying to get a quote from does not offer you any clue as to what kind of
price range they are looking for in their parts? For example, let's say I
want to purchase a DSP chip that has been out of production for several
years, and nobody anywhere stocks it, and so my first guess might be that a
reasonable offer for 50 such chips might be $4.00 each, but the firm I'm
submitting the RFQ to won't even begin to consider an offer for any of these
chips at this quantity at less than - say - $25.00 each, and when they get
my RFQ that shoots for $4.00, they wonder what planet I'm living on or if
I'm completely out of touch or something.. Is there some way that I should
have some indication of what the chip should be worth before I submit an
RFQ? I know this must seem like a pretty left-field question, but hey - I'm
just given to wonder and have to ask. Anyone want to offer me any
enlightenment?

Thanks,
Jim Butler
Butler Electronics

I think if you don't know the approximate price you won't have a clue.

Some parts have big quanitities floating around from cancelled orders,
are oddball with few alternate applications, and are cheap compared to
the original price. Some, especially some microcontroller-type
products, may be in short supply, and worth a lot to those who have
money invested in software and qualification and don't want to redo
their design for the sake of a few thousand dollars worth of parts.
Other parts are commodity and will go for around the usual price,
unless there is a supply squeeze, in which case they can skyrocket.

I never thought this "target price" was a fair question anyway. Tell
me your best selling price and let's see if it's good enough...


Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany
--
"it's the network..." "The Journey is the reward"
speff@interlog.com Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com
Embedded software/hardware/analog Info for designers: http://www.speff.com

 

[Peter A Forbes]

On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 01:49:38 -0600, "Jim Butler" <jbutler9@sw.rr.com> wrote:

This may seem like a stupid question, but I've been wondering this for quite
a while now, and I hope someone here can help me answer this:

<snipped>

Thanks,
Jim Butler

Jim:

It depends on how many are out there and who has them.

We used to use an old Ferranti timer IC: ZN1034E that was then manufactured by
Plessey and then GEC-Plessey-Siemens until a few years ago.

Once production stopped, we found stock in many places until finally we were
down to a few suppliers and lots of would-be sellers. We did a one-time purchase
at a reasonable price (they were in Finland) and still have a few remaining for
repairs etc. We recently noticed that someone is supposed to have 21k stock of
these chips, but I think it is vapour.

Your best bet is always to try and find a stockist and not go through the
regular 'buy-in and sell-out' people who come up on Google. The smaller guys are
pretty good, although they are not so slow that they won't make a killing if
they can!

I'd suggest a couple of people, but we are in the UK and our contacts are
probably of no use. If you had a part# I could ask our guys to look at it for
you if you want.

Regards,

Peter



--
Peter & Rita Forbes
Email: diesel@easynet.co.uk
Web: http://www.oldengine.org/members/diesel

 

[Jim Butler]

This may seem like a stupid question, but I've been wondering this for quite
a while now, and I hope someone here can help me answer this:
When you go looking on the web for a source to purchase some part, and you
can't find it in any of the usual vendor's catalogues (i.e. Digikey, Newark,
etc.) and you do a web search for it, invariably you will get lots of links
to pages for you to submit a Request For Quote. Now here is the question:
How in the world are you supposed to know what price range should seem
reasonable for a part (any part) when 1) you can't find any reference prices
from any competitors anywhere on the net, and 2) the firm that you are
trying to get a quote from does not offer you any clue as to what kind of
price range they are looking for in their parts? For example, let's say I
want to purchase a DSP chip that has been out of production for several
years, and nobody anywhere stocks it, and so my first guess might be that a
reasonable offer for 50 such chips might be $4.00 each, but the firm I'm
submitting the RFQ to won't even begin to consider an offer for any of these
chips at this quantity at less than - say - $25.00 each, and when they get
my RFQ that shoots for $4.00, they wonder what planet I'm living on or if
I'm completely out of touch or something.. Is there some way that I should
have some indication of what the chip should be worth before I submit an
RFQ? I know this must seem like a pretty left-field question, but hey - I'm
just given to wonder and have to ask. Anyone want to offer me any
enlightenment?

Thanks,
Jim Butler
Butler Electronics