To keep pace with rapid advances in technology, today’s test and measurement engineers seek longer lasting products and more technical support. This is according to a global survey of almost 1,300 professional test and measurement engineers conducted by Tektronix.
Designed to provide greater insight into the technologies, challenges and opportunities faced by engineers, the results showed what engineers want and need from test and measurement manufacturers, and the quality and attributes they demand from their instruments.
Long instrument lifetime & greater reliability
Engineers want a long lifetime from their instruments, according to the survey conducted between April and May 2021. Over a third of respondents (approximately 36%) expect equipment to last more than ten years, while around one fifth (roughly 21%) demand a lifetime of more than five years, backing up findings that engineers place a high value on instrument reliability.
Engineer respondents say they want to protect their investment and get continued value from their purchase, which is in-line with organisations offering continuous service and technical support. Tektronix offers various warranty lengths by product type. Calibration and repair support for each product typically continues for a minimum of five years after production ends.
Technical support
When asked about the services they value the most, the technical support offered by a vendor came out on top (cited by 72 %of respondents).
Tektronix says it strives to support engineers’ needs by offering new ways of working, including remote control capabilities such as our TekScope™ and TekDrive™, which enable cloud based software defined engineering, that have grown significantly in importance over the last 18 months. Highly appreciated by Tektronix’s customers is also the provision of support through a dedicated technical Pan-European support team; as well as a European multilingual ‘Centre of Excellence’ (CoE) team. Solutions such as virtual online product demonstrations have been very popular with our customers throughout the pandemic.
Other key factors that survey participants said they value from their vendors included:
- Good user manuals (69%),
- Good supply of accessories and probes (50%), and
- Applications’ notes (43%).
Post-sales support
Post-sales support such as calibration, repair and training were also mentioned as of significant value to today’s engineers. Tektronix has the comprehensive network of repair and calibration services for any brand of test and measurement equipment and also offers asset management and factory service plans. Tektronix also provides extensive online training resources, including application notes, training videos and webinars.
“We thank all the 1,300 engineers that answered to this survey to help us improve. The findings enable us to continue building on our unique 75-year heritage to support engineers across multiple applications around the world. We will continue investing in reliability, high quality products and extended services to meet our customer’s requirements,” says Maria Heriz, vice president, EMEAI, Tektronix.
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