Depot Services: Is it better to build or outsource?
As an Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM), the cost and time associated with storing, servicing, and supporting all of your products can be challenging. You are essentially supporting legacy products while innovating and improving your new products. In some cases, outsourcing your depot services can be more beneficial to reducing costs while increasing the time your team collaborates and innovates new products.
Why would you consider outsourcing your depot services over servicing in-house? Let’s start by explaining what depot services are, and where outsourcing can help.
What is Depot Service?
A Depot is generally set up to service any devices that need updating or repair. After Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) send their devices to a depot service center, the depot will then ship the device back to customers once it is repaired.
Typically, depot services include:
Quest’s Depot services operate in World Class facilities and are governed by a mature Quality Management System ensuring all of devices are repaired to OEM specifications.
Benefits of Outsourcing your Depot Repair Services
The benefits of outsourcing your company’s devices depend on various factors. When considering the benefits of outsourcing, keep in mind your company’s scalability, locations, and staffing availability.
Scalability
Growing companies just beginning to commercialize devices can still benefit from partnering with a depot repair service because they don’t have to use their own limited resources to invest in repair infrastructure. As the company scales, using a certified third party service provider with IT systems, technicians, and tools already in place can help fast track and streamline the scaling process. Internal resources can now focus on growth instead of managing depot repair infrastructure.
Similarly, larger-scale companies with a larger device install base spread globally can find great value in partnering with a depot service provider such as Quest. Larger organizations can sometimes lose nimbleness and efficiency and can have difficulty maximizing utilization rates supporting their own product sets. Quest Depot Repair centers are built on the practice of having certified technicians supporting product while also leveraging shared resources across other supporting departments such as quality, administrative support and shipping and receiving personnel to name a few. Quest’s infrastructure also hosts multiple OEM tenants, resulting in a better facility utilization rate and cost structure leading to lower operating costs all while meeting or exceeding mutually agreed to repair and customer experience metrics.
Shipping devices to Quest for service means your company doesn’t have to invest in the technology, infrastructure and resources for upkeep. Our services include:
Locations
At Quest, we offer over access to a network of global depot facilities on nearly every continent. We provide repair services for many OEM’s worldwide resulting in a cost-effective and readily available infrastructure that allows rapid scaling of services without all of the unnecessary capital and time investments an OEM would need to make on its own.
Our global repair depots are have ISO accreditation electrostatic (ESD) controls, expertly trained technicians certified by our OEM clients, and more.
We understand OEM equipment and how to handle repairs properly, from spare parts testing and repair to complete device testing and repair services.
This allows us to partner with OEM providers globally to alleviate any concerns regarding in region repair strategies.
Staffing
Partnering with Quest eases the strain on your company to provide correct and timely service. Repairing devices internally tends to deplete your resources that could be allocated towards innovation, revenue generation and customer experience enhancement.
For businesses servicing their own devices, they must also consider costs for onboarding costs for internal employees such as new employee salaries, benefits, overtime expenses, turnover and retraining costs which can be a drain on profits and resources as well as impact customer experience.
Working with Quest International includes a quality centric partner offering a fully program managed solution including highly trained staff and technicians to provide measured on outcome and deliverables at a predictable cost model. With approval of our OEM clients Quest leverage master trainers to grow and scale service resources ensuring a self-sufficient and autonomous operation meeting your desired service goals and objectives.
Cost to build a depot
OEMs spend a significant amount of company time and monetary resources on building a brick and mortar warehouse for service and repairs that take away from the OEM’s original purpose which is innovating cutting edge technology.
Depot repair facilities require very strict quality controls and regulation around temperature and humidity monitoring and management as well as safety and test equipment needed to ensure devices function properly after any repair activity.
Building a brick-and-mortar warehouse includes soft, hard, and long-term costs: soft costs include permits, equipment, insurance, design, engineering, taxes, legal fees, and furniture. Hard costs include labor, materials, equipment, and certifications. Long-term costs include maintenance, indoor environment quality controls, quality management system certification and utility costs.
A 50,000 sq. ft. warehouse can extremely costly to build and maintain. This doesn’t include the cost of hiring technicians, specialists and purchasing the infrastructure (i.e. benches, tooling and equipment) to fix the devices or any additional long-term costs.
Instead, partnering with a provider focused on these services can drastically offload the strain of allocating precious resources to service equipment, freeing up existing personnel to focus more on innovation and customer experience.
Did you know that depot services are not the only form of device repair Quest offers? Field services are another cost saving resource for OEMs to service devices. Learn more in our article here.
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