There is a misconception that transceivers are a small piece of a company’s overall hardware spend. The inconvenient truth when purchasing OEM branded products is, they can account for 30% or more of the cost of the actual piece of hardware they populate. This does not account for exponential traffic growth that ultimately leads to the need for higher data rates and the purchase of new transceivers.
Big name OEMs such as Cisco, HP, and Juniper don’t actually build the transceivers they sell. They are often purchased from global contract manufacturers and then marked up before being sold to you at inflated prices.
The practical solution is to give third-party transceivers a try, but they all aren’t created equal. Reputable vendors of third-party options source the same transceivers from those same contract manufacturers, rebrand them and sell them, with a lifetime warranty, at substantial discounts to OEM pricing resulting in exceptional, consistent, and predictable performance.
If that sounds too good to be true, look to Gartner, who says OEM optics are the “biggest rip-off in networking” and that OEMs regularly sow fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) to steer customers away from lower-priced, functionally equivalent third-party transceivers. “We’ve observed that network OEMs and their channels use aggressive sales tactics to scare enterprises away from third-party optics, claiming it is “illegal” to use them, or that it will ‘void the warranty.’ This is simply not true.” In fact, the use of non-OEM products/accessories is protected under the FTC’s Magnuson-Moss Act/Tie-in Sales Provisions and the Sherman Antitrust Act. Basically, OEMs cannot void your warranty so there’s no reason not to realize these savings.
All Gencom products, Trifecta’s own brand of third-party optics, transceivers, and cables are labelled, coded and packaged to meet or exceed the specification of the product provided by the manufacturer at a fraction of the price. Each item is subject to in-depth qualification and testing to ensure that it will be 100% compatible with the OEM solution and will accommodate the demands of the most rigorous technology environments. Enjoy the peace of mind Gencom and Trifecta Networks can bring to your next IT project.