3 ms·

Used to work in Europe for a CA based company. Every tender required at least 7 years of support, sometimes 10, including all parts. Good to see them catching u

Used to work in Europe for a CA based company. Every tender required at least 7 years of support, sometimes 10, including all parts. Good to see them catching up

solardev 3y ago
What's a tender and why does it need 7 years of support?
- varjag 3y ago
  A bidding process. In certain industries life cycle requirements are common (e.g. our customers expect 15 to 20 years of product lifetime) but it is far from universal and isn't enforced by a EU wide law AFAIK.
  - bombcar 3y ago
    Yep - if you’re a business wanting to buy a million dollar machine to do whatever, you want some assurance that it can be repaired and will be working until replacement time (at least the depreciation schedule, often many MANY years longer).
    - solardev 3y ago
      That's amazing. I'm happy when my npm packages last more than 2 months
      - bombcar 3y ago
        Physical things have interesting support - there are actually companies whose entire business model is support equipment from companies that have been gone 40+ years.
        HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
        Right. My little cottage industry/side gig used to build electronic boards that were used to interface 40+ year old machine tools to modern controls when the original controllers broke and replacements weren't available. I sold to a small company that did nothing but retrofits like that. Really wish I could find more niches like this. It's a boring but profitable domain to get into.
  - HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
    Yup. At my last job, we designed our products (medical instruments) for a service life of 15 years and a market lifetime of 25. i.e., from the time the product was released to the market, you could expect Service and Support and spare parts to be available for at least 25 years and the device itself was expected to last 15 years in the field. Of course, I'm talking about large machines that cost between $500k - $1M each, so...
robertlagrant 3y ago
> Used to work in Europe for a CA based company. Every tender required at least 7 years of support, sometimes 10, including all parts. Good to see them catching up This is for consumer goods. It's not the same. Consumers could always decide to only buy things with 7 years of support, like your tender process. The "catching up" nonsense isn't great either.

Used to work in Europe for a CA based company. Every tender required at least 7 years of support, sometimes 10, including all parts. Good to see them catching up

solardev 3y ago

What's a tender and why does it need 7 years of support?

varjag 3y ago
A bidding process. In certain industries life cycle requirements are common (e.g. our customers expect 15 to 20 years of product lifetime) but it is far from universal and isn't enforced by a EU wide law AFAIK.
- bombcar 3y ago
  Yep - if you’re a business wanting to buy a million dollar machine to do whatever, you want some assurance that it can be repaired and will be working until replacement time (at least the depreciation schedule, often many MANY years longer).
  - solardev 3y ago
    That's amazing. I'm happy when my npm packages last more than 2 months
    - bombcar 3y ago
      Physical things have interesting support - there are actually companies whose entire business model is support equipment from companies that have been gone 40+ years.
      - HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
        Right. My little cottage industry/side gig used to build electronic boards that were used to interface 40+ year old machine tools to modern controls when the original controllers broke and replacements weren't available. I sold to a small company that did nothing but retrofits like that. Really wish I could find more niches like this. It's a boring but profitable domain to get into.
- HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
  Yup. At my last job, we designed our products (medical instruments) for a service life of 15 years and a market lifetime of 25. i.e., from the time the product was released to the market, you could expect Service and Support and spare parts to be available for at least 25 years and the device itself was expected to last 15 years in the field. Of course, I'm talking about large machines that cost between $500k - $1M each, so...

robertlagrant 3y ago

> Used to work in Europe for a CA based company. Every tender required at least 7 years of support, sometimes 10, including all parts. Good to see them catching up This is for consumer goods. It's not the same. Consumers could always decide to only buy things with 7 years of support, like your tender process. The "catching up" nonsense isn't great either.