End of Life (EoL) is a term used by Original Equipment Manufacturers to indicate that a piece of equipment has reached the end of its “useful life” and will no longer be marketed, sold or updated after a specified date. End of Service Life (EoSL), on the other hand, is when a manufacturer stops selling a piece of equipment and in most cases no longer provides maintenance services or updates after a particular date.
The biggest differentiating factor between EoL and EoSL is the support. The EoSL label is more final than EoL. At this stage, the OEM stops selling the product and it won’t offer any more maintenance or support.
It may feel like you have little choice other than to replace equipment if you are told by your OEM that your kit is being made EoL or EoSL. It might feel like you have to purchase new product if you want to continue getting support, which can mean using a large amount of your budget and losing the value of the old hardware.
If you want to keep your existing equipment, you’ll have to continue without OEM support, dealing with the maintenance repairs by yourself. That can often require a higher level of expertise and additional costs in terms of your IT department sourcing replacement parts, that can be hard to find and the engineering time to replace them.
For an annual cost that would be considerably cheaper than an extended OEM warranty, if it’s even available, another option that may work for your business is Third Party Maintenance. A TPM company, such as Amtec, can offer continued support when the OEM support ends and keep your hardware running smoothly for years after it is EoL or EoSL.
Your business may not be ready for the large investment of replacing server, storage or networking hardware, especially if your existing equipment is working just as you want it to. You can significantly extend the life of your EoL or EoSL hardware by looking at TPM. A TPM company like Amtec can perform repairs or fixes as needed, for many years after the end of OEM’s support.
TPM companies will typically have access to OEM parts through trusted partners channels or the OEMs themselves. They provide experienced, expert service, at the same or higher level of standards as the OEM, but at a much reduced cost. Companies that offer TPM services often exceed the original service level agreement, which would allow you to free up your company’s capital by allowing you to choose to upgrade your equipment when you want to and to continue to use your existing hardware how you want to.
Get in touch with Amtec today to see how much you can save. Contact our team at contact@amtecgroup.co.uk. Or call us on 01202 597400.
