Protect yourself against counterfeits in these times of shortages

In February this year EPS News reported severe Electronic Component Shortages Possible in 2017.

Since December 2016 we have experienced a significant rise in the number of enquiries we are receive each day. Our current volume of enquiries for electronic component stock is around 3 times higher than the same time last year.

We are seeing shortages on a wide variety of products and brands. We are still nowhere near the heights of the shortages witnessed in 1999 / 2000 but if you were around then, you may remember that the lead up to that peak period was quite gradual.

When you search Franchised Distribution for the stock you will often be met with "no stock", "Limited Supply - Call", "Temporarily Out of Stock" which are all clear indications that components are in short supply. It has been a long time since we have seen this phenomenon. It is not the fault of the procurement professionals because many of them were still in school the last time our industry had such challenges to deal with.

The effect of shortages has raised another concern for the industry. We are seeing a significant rise in the number of "new" large OEM and EMS companies coming directly to us as an Independent Distributor as their last line of defence. We are not currently on some of these companies approved supplier lists so clearly protocols are being broken in the desperate attempt to find stock. Obviously, our new customers are safe with us as our stock is fully traceable back to the manufacturer but the question needs to be asked, who else are they opening up their supply chain to?

Breaking approved supply chain processes increases the risk of counterfeits. We are confident in the quality of the fully traceable stock we supply. We offer a 100% anti-counterfeit guarantee with the 12-month warranty on all products which not all independent distributors can provide.