The COVID 19 crisis has caused a slowdown in production and disruptions in the supply chain and has impacted many countries around the globe. Electronics Components Distributors are among the first to feel the impact of the COVID 19 outbreak.
Electro Bits Magazine, Technical Editor, Pratibha Rawat caught up with Teri Ivaniszyn, vice president, operational excellence for Digi-Key Electronics to understand how Digi-key Electronics addresses the Coronavirus impact on its global supply chain and how its supporting customers in COVID-19 situation.
WHAT IMPACT CORONAVIRUS HAS SHOWN ON DIGI KEY SUPPLY CHAIN?
At Digi-Key, our thoughts and prayers go out to everyone impacted by COVID-19 worldwide, and our primary concern is for the health and safety of our team members, customers and business partners. While the COVID-19 situation is rapidly evolving and we don’t know all of the impacts yet, we do know that our business model positions us with substantial inventory to offer minimal disruption to our customers.
While doing our part to prevent the spread of COVID-19 with strict social distancing, increased deep cleaning and having many employees work from home, Digi-Key will remain open and continue to fulfill orders. We are exempt from the statewide shelter in place regulations because the products and services we provide are essential in the fight against COVID-19 and directly serve the health, safety and welfare of the public. For example, Digi-Key’s engineers were part of a small team working in partnership with the University of Minnesota to design and supply additional ventilators needed to keep critically ill COVID-19 patients alive as the world faces a critical shortage. Digi-Key is also supplying components to customers manufacturing thermometers, motion-activated hand sanitizing stations, and equipment needed for employees working remotely.
Factories in China are slowly getting back up and running, and while it will take some time for them to be back to full production, Digi-Key’s inventory-rich model continues to benefit our customers.
WHAT MEASURES DIGI KEY IS IMPLEMENTING TO MINIMIZE THIS ISSUE?
Digi-Key delivers consistency and continuity to our customers around the world by providing the broadest selection of products and high levels of inventory – more than 10 million products globally, with more than 2.2 million in stock from over 850 quality name-brand manufacturers. Digi-Key’s one, central U.S.-based warehouse serves all of our customers globally, providing consistency and efficiency through times of change and uncertainty. Our strong relationships with logistics partners bring additional support and consistent delivery of products to our customers.
We’re working closely with our carrier partners to mitigate impact on cargo plans. We’re providing updates and FAQs on our website (https://www.digikey.com/en/help/coronavirus) for our customers and we’re in constant communication with our suppliers. While these are unprecedented times, we’re working to monitor the situation with suppliers and we’re getting updates regularly so notify customers as soon as possible regarding any changes in lead times.