PF: You know, I went away for a few years to help set up CT tube manufacturing at another company before returning to Chronos in 2019. It seems while I was gone some people forgot how essential Dunlee and Chronos tubes are to their own business models.

So, you’ve got private equity-backed companies investing millions of dollars to build out their service delivery networks, and some of them are using cheap alternative brand OEM tubes made in India to service their accounts. You’ve also got some excellent third-party parts companies who’ve lost their way. OEMs say they want to partner with third parties, but when it comes to replacement tubes it seems they only want to offer competitive prices once Chronos has introduced an alternative product.

But don’t be fooled, when the OEM drops their prices by up to 80 or even 90% their intent is to make it unprofitable for Chronos to build these replacement tubes. Their strategy is rather clever. By offering cheap OEM tubes to ISOs and parts distributors, and even getting them to compete for the privilege of distributing these tubes, the OEMs are trying to turn these companies into instruments of their own destruction.
Anytime a third-party sells an OEM tube, there is an OEM marketing person who is rolling on the floor laughing. In the long run, in this dystopian OEM vision of the future only OEM service is possible because Chronos doesn’t develop new products, and the OEM tube prices never drop from $250,000 to $50,000. Chronos is a for-profit enterprise, and we provide good jobs to Americans right here at home, and so I don’t mind saying that to a large degree we are coin-operated.

My main advice to CT stakeholders would be to support the ones who brought you to the dance by insisting on Chronos tubes, and Chronos will continue to support you with new products. Believe me, when informed customers choose to service their CT equipment with high quality Chronos tubes, that OEM marketing person isn’t laughing as much.

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