Global catalog distributor Digi-Key Corp. recently launched new and improved online tools to help customers better access its more than 1 million in-stock products.
An improved Bill of Materials (BOM) manager, a scheduled shipments feature, and shopping cart enhancements are among the improvements the company announced this month.
“Digi-Key is dedicated to continually improving the user experience,” Tony Harris, Digi-Key’s chief marketing officer said in a statement announcing the new features March 14. “Our customers tell us that they appreciate how fast and easy they can compare and select from among hundreds of thousands of parts available for immediate delivery. There isn’t another BOM manager available today that links to this volume of in-stock parts. This kind of high-value offering is central to Digi-Key’s commitment to being the best available resource for both purchasers and engineers.”
The enhanced BOM manager is a Web-based tool that makes it easy for electronic component buyers to create and save their BOM at all stages of product design. Users can quickly view inventory availability, price breaks, regulatory compliance data, and other information. They can sign in as a registered user, upload their parts lists and compare them with Digi-Key’s product lists. The tool also makes it easy to create and save a BOM and immediately download quotes to their desktop, Digi-Key says.
In addition, users can save and share BOM data and product designs, and choose different kitting and packaging options.
The distributor’s new scheduled shipment feature lets users break a line item into multiple shipments and/or choose to have each line item on an order ship separately and arrive on different dates. This helps customers reduce inventory costs and save administrative time and resources, the distributor says. Shopping cart updates include the new ability to label shopping carts with unique names instead of relying on Web IDs and sales order numbers, and a “combine carts” feature that allows users to combine multiple carts from two different locations.
