Another source of discounted IT products has been the secondhand market, which Cisco and other vendors legitimized by promoting "authorized" refurbished equipment repossessed through their credit units. New online auction houses have helped connect sellers with buyers.
Todd Schoenfeld, IT director at Point Biomedical Corp., a developer of medical imaging equipment in San Carlos, Calif., recently bought a Compaq tape library from a bankrupt biotech firm at a liquidation auction. The item, which lists for $200,000, cost him a mere $6,000. With his venture capital-backed firm just now ramping up for its first product release after seven years in development, Schoenfeld is on the prowl for bargains to equip hundreds of new hires planned for 2004. He also keeps a close eye on eBay. At press time, he was looking for a Compaq G3 server that was no more than two years old.
Of course, used equipment comes with hidden expenses and pitfalls. For one thing, a three-month maintenance and support contract with Hewlett-Packard, which now owns Compaq, costs more than the equipment itself, Schoenfeld says. Before he bought the tape library, he checked with HP to make sure it would offer a service plan. "We didn't want to get a doorstop," he says.
Although IT vendors have been careful to devise programs that don't cannibalize their core businesses, soft demand has kept prices low on new equipment.
"Every single category--storage, computers, networking--is trending to be more cost-effective than a year or two ago," says Tony Scott, chief technology officer at General Motors, which has cut its IT budget by $1 billion, to $3 billion, since spinning off IT consulting firm EDS in 1996. In Scott's view, information security is among the only IT categories that carry a premium today.
Subsea cable alternatives can provide a level of comfort for those concerned about disruptions. Realistically, they will continue to play a small, but critical role in the short term.
Maintaining existing network infrastructures often incurs huge technical debt before newer technologies are adopted over time.
Amid ongoing regional uncertainties, telecom infrastructure in the Middle East has expand to include terrestrial low-latency network infrastructure, which offers resilience and agility in navigating political complexities without relying solely on undersea networks.
