Device Count, a Marketing Ploy???

July 17, 2008 - PRLog -- Nowadays; many devices support multiple package types. So, most programmer manufacturers count different package types as one device. There is an industry consensus on this. All the large manufacturers list devices with the supported package types and count total numbers as supported devices.

However, some programmer manufacturers have raised an issue about the device count. So, let’s give an example. An IC device comes with DIP and BGA type packages. Programmer manufacturer A supports both package types and B supports only a DIP type. If a customer needs a support for BGA type he will have to go to company A and not company B. The company B lost a sale because they didn’t support the BGA type. So, is it important to put in engineering and manufacturing resources to develop and manufacture different package types? It definitely is.  It often makes a difference between making a sale or not.

So, why some companies are complaining about high device count of other companies? Because they don’t have enough financial and manpower resources to develop and manufacture many different adapters, but don’t want to admit it. Manufacturing and stocking many socket adapters cause significant strain on financial and engineering resources and only some larger programmer companies can undertake them.

So, is showing high device count a marketing ploy?    
- No, it shows strength of the company.

Then, is it a sour grape by lesser companies who cannot undertake such a task?        
- It sure is.

Sam
President
Xeltek Inc.

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Xeltek manufactures a family of low-cost eprom programmer, gang programmer, PIC programmer, AVR programmer, universal programmer, device programmer, and IC programmer including SuperPro® series.