The reliable spine
The non-AI spine is the source-linked workflow: clean records, rules, calculations, integrations, exception queues, approvals and reporting for Quote from a drawing or BOQ, with the metal index built in.
Electricals & Electronics
Quote from a drawing or BOQ, with the metal index built in
A panel, transformer, or board is quoted from a drawing, a BOQ, or a customer BOM, and the quote is the place margin is won or lost. Each estimator costs it their own way (bought-outs, metal by weight, process, overhead, gut margin), tooling and test cost are guessed, and the moment copper, aluminium, or CRGO moves the old quote is silently wrong. Turnaround runs in days; the customer's window is hours; the same job gets quoted at two prices by two people. This is the single most defining margin leak in the industry, sharper here than in any sibling sector. Metal is a large share of cost depending on the segment, the price moves daily, and most firms quote and hold prices on a stale index, then absorb the swing because they cannot pass it through in a competitive tender or a running dealer price list. A half-point of unmanaged pass-through is the year's profit.
Who has it
Sharpest for switchgear, panel and transformer makers quoting against a drawing or spec, and for EMS contract builders quoting from a customer BOM; cable, winding, LED and lighting makers fold the same metal-index discipline into their channel pricing.
What we build
One standard costing template (bought-outs to metal-by-weight to process to overhead to margin) so every quote is built the same way, an RFQ and quote register that versions each quote, and a metal-index link that re-prices the quote when copper, aluminium, or CRGO moves, wired straight into quoting. For build-to-design EMS, the costing reads the customer BOM and prices it against current component cost. The metal-index layer links every active quote, order, and price list to the live copper, aluminium, or CRGO index, flags every job whose priced metal assumption has drifted from today's index, computes the pass-through due, and feeds the re-price back into both the quote and the channel price list. For running orders it flags the exposure so a price-revision conversation happens before the margin is gone, not after.
What is automated, where AI helps, who signs off
Automation for the routine. A person on every decision that matters.
Where AI helps
AI is limited to bounded reading, extraction, matching, clustering or drafting from the firm's own data for Quote from a drawing or BOQ, with the metal index built in; it never owns the number, the approval, the promise or the decision.
Who signs off
A named person signs off anything touching money, stock, a customer promise, a regulated filing, a payment, a price, a credit decision or a people decision.
What changes day to day
Quote turnaround drops from days to under a day; quoting stops depending on which estimator is in; the metal assumption is explicit and re-priced, not stale. The metal pass-through stops leaking; price-revision conversations happen on time; quotes never go out on a stale index.
Illustrative outcome
Quote turnaround drops from days to under a day; quoting stops depending on which estimator is in; the metal assumption is explicit and re-priced, not stale. The metal pass-through stops leaking; price-revision conversations happen on time; quotes never go out on a stale index. Illustrative; final numbers come from your own data.
Illustrative; final numbers come from your own data.
Path to the build
How this one gets built.
Book a free 60-minute call, then a free Blueprint on the firm's own records. Deep-dive and build, followed by run and govern so the workflow keeps paying back.
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What tends to pair with this one.
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