One question we’re often asked by partners and end-users is how and where we source our parts. Through decades of experience dealing with maintenance issues and working with secondary hardware providers for parts, we’ve built a global supply chain enabling parts delivery 24x7x365.

In this time of global supply chain issues, we all know it’s even more important to have strategic relationship key suppliers that we’re confident will be able to fulfill commitments on a timely basis. We’re excited to announce a new strategic partnership with Vibrant Technologies that enhances how we service our TPM partners and end-users.

Together we’ve prepared a video that highlights the important components of this innovative approach to TPM for networking, data storage and servers. We suggest you watch it here to get a sense for why we’re so excited to formalize this partnership.

Trusted Supply Chain Ensures Top Level Parts Availability So Partners and End Users Have Peace of Mind

While we use several key secondary hardware providers for IT infrastructure parts, we felt it was critical to rely on our trusted resource Vibrant Technologies. In order to ensure that we have top of the line quality parts for our clients, we’ve created a strategic partnership with Vibrant.

Who is Vibrant Technologies? They are based in Eden Prairie, Minnesota just outside of Minneapolis and were founded in 1998. They now offer refurbished and new IT hardware spanning virtually all the major OEMs to over 60,000 customers. They have the technical, strategic and testing warehouse space occupying over 75,000 square feet with a state-of-the-art facility.

As we onboard new clients, we work with Vibrant to ensure that we have the parts on site and/or ready to ship.

There are 3 levels of parts availability:

1. On site spares.
2. Forward Stocking locations (S3P has 24 in the United States and 12 internationally).
3. 75,000 square foot warehouse and operations center in Eden Prairie 24x7x365 with the same day Air courier parts ready to go.

Depending on the required Service Level Agreement (SLA) to fit the contract and client needs, we asses where spares and parts are deployed.

In the event a failed part requires immediate attention, our technical case managers can engage our same day world-wide courier partner Airspace. This service exceeds overnight shipping as there are capabilities to deliver parts the same day if necessary. Airspace offers world class courier and delivery services across the globe with the best possible technology in the industry. This results in speed, visibility (via GPS tracking) and constant communication to know that the fastest most reliable means are being used to deliver mission critical parts. Find out more about Airspace at www.airspace.com.

Our Process To Deliver On Our Promises

For each of our end-users and channel partners there is a direct promise we are making…we’ll be there exactly as we’ve jointly determined based on the SLAs in your contract.

Over several decades we’ve developed a process that works for us, our partners and the end users. We’re constantly improving and refining our process to keep pace with how the IT world is changing. Our strategic partnership with Vibrant is just another step to bring the best-of-the-best TPM to market.

Below you can see how this process works in action:

Key Aspects of Parts Fulfillment With Vibrant

The process outlined above begins each time a client opens a problem ticket. Vibrant is a key partner in the loop, ensuring we have quality parts exactly when the parts are needed by our clients.

Jennifer Vanderhorst Larson, CEO of Vibrant, described the extensive procedures that are instigated on their end to fulfill parts,  “Everything is tested at Vibrant. When Smart has an order, it goes directly to a dedicated email. …They pull the part and often retest…. It’s quality checked by another technician… and then quality checked in shipping. We have 5-6 people dedicated to Smart.”

The key components of the partnership are the following.

• We have the parts available 24/7/365
• These are the best of the best parts available in the industry based on quality, reliability and breadth of what is needed.
• Because of our technical case management system and critical partnerships with Vibrant and Airspace, timeliness is achieved insuring that problems are solved within required SLAs.

In short, we’re confident this partnership between Smart 3rd Party and Vibrant is just one more advancement in out quest to deliver the best solution for TPM to our channel partners’ and end-user clients.

Summary of Takeaways:

1. World class TPM requires a process for responding to problems and fulfilling parts on a timely basis.
2. Smart 3rd Party has developed an ecosystem of global sources of supply that is utilized for case resolution every day.
3. We’ve formalized an exciting strategic partnership with industry leader, Vibrant Technologies whereby we now involve them in each step of our Problem Resolution Process.
4. Timeliness is key to resolving problems and our process ensures constant communication with the end-users until problem resolution.
5. We are able to call on Airspace where necessary for Air courier same day services.

Links/Resources:

• Video for partnership ( Process of Problem Resolution |Smart 3rd Party )
• Vibrant Technologies ( www.vibrant.com )
• Airspace ( www.airspace.com )