Chintan Sutaria: CalcuQuote Aims to Disrupt EMS Quoting Status Quo

Estimated reading time: 9 minutes

Sutaria: Everyone at our company is in Customer Support; it’s their first title. We provide in-app chat on every screen of our application so you can instantly get access to everybody on our team. Our customers love that functionality. We can instantly answer quick questions. If they want to learn how to do something, we link them to an article in our knowledge base. We have customers asking us consultative questions. For example, if there's a new employee that says “Hey, I can't find out anything about this part number.” We'll help them figure out why that might be the case.

Warner: Since you've been at this a little over a year, what kind of feedback are you getting from your customers that had it in place for a while?

Sutaria: I think overwhelmingly our customers have validated that we've made the RFQ process faster and easier. It’s easier for new employees to get on-board as well. Quoting is very complicated until you put some process around it, and that's what we're trying to achieve.

Warner: That's exciting. You're like the rock star of the quoting world.

Sutaria: It's not something that you can tell your friends about (Laughs), but yes.

Warner: Yeah, not many understand what we all do for a living beyond our little universe! Talk about the chat window a bit more and how that provides meaningful support in real time.

Sutaria: One of the ways we provide support for our customers is that at any screen, at any point, they can click a button and get instant chat with our support. It shows up on our phones, computer screens, emails, everything. We get very friendly with our customers as part of the subscription. We get to know each other on a first-name basis, and it's great because it really fosters that feeling that there's a partner, because you can reach each other at any time. It's like having a co-worker sitting next to you that knows how to use the software very well. It's worked out. We started it a little over a year ago, and it's something that has absolutely been great for building relationships with our customers.

Warner: How did SMTAI go for you this year? How was the traffic at your booth and what kind of interest did you see?

Sutaria: This year's show has been great. We debuted last year at SMTAI and got to meet a lot of people. That's how we got our first batch of customers, and it proved to be very fruitful. This year was great because we got to see them again, and they're coming back and telling us what they like about our product, what they like about working with us, and it's been really exciting to see those positive reviews coming back face to face. The other thing is meeting people in the industry like yourself—that in general is just a huge opportunity at these events.

Warner: It's always great to be face to face.

Sutaria: One thing I always say is that I just left the EMS industry, but I didn't leave it. I want to still understand what's going on, what challenges people are facing and so on, and attending events like SMTAI is great for that.

Warner: It's a great story. Thanks for sharing it with us. It's been nice to meet you at the show and I look forward to staying in touch and hearing what type of traction you get in the industry. Thank you very much!

Sutaria: Thank you.

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