Sourcing Long Lead Time and Obsolete Hard-to-Find Electronic Components

AERI finds parts that are no longer available through authorized channels, then inspects them in our in-house QC lab before they ship. An independent distributor for aerospace, defense, medical, and industrial OEMs since 1994.

AS6081 founding member. In-house lab. Vetted global supplier network.

AERI is an independent electronic component distributor that specializes in sourcing obsolete, end-of-life, allocated, and hard-to-find components. When a part is discontinued, on allocation, or stretched to a 40-week lead time, your production line still has to run. AERI locates those parts through a global network of suppliers we have known and vetted since 1994, inspects them in our own lab, and delivers them with documentation you can hand to your quality team. Finding the parts is the first promise. Proving they are authentic is the second.

What AERI sources

If a component is hard to get, it is in our lane. AERI sources:

• Obsolete and end-of-life (EOL) components. Parts the manufacturer has discontinued and authorized distributors no longer stock.
• Allocation and shortage parts. Components still in production but unavailable because demand has outrun supply.
• Long-lead-time parts. Active components quoted at 20, 30, or more than 40 weeks when you need them now.
• Last-time-buy and legacy support. Components for programs that must stay in service for years or decades after the part went out of production.
• Hard-to-find active and passive components across most manufacturers and categories.

Why components become hard to find

Parts go scarce for a few predictable reasons, and each one is a moment when a buyer needs a sourcing partner.

• Obsolescence. Manufacturers discontinue older parts to free up capacity for newer products. The systems built around those parts often outlive them by decades, which is why aerospace, defense, and medical programs feel obsolescence first. In defense, this risk is managed formally as DMSMS (Diminishing Manufacturing Sources and Material Shortages).
• Allocation and shortages. A plant fire, a natural disaster, a regulation change, or a sudden spike in demand can put an active part on allocation overnight.
• The current memory squeeze. Through 2026, manufacturers have shifted capacity toward high-bandwidth memory for AI servers. That has pulled standard memory and other components away from medical, aerospace, and industrial builders who were never in the AI market to begin with. Lead times that used to run 4 to 6 weeks now stretch past 20.

When any of these hits, the buyer's problem is the same: find the part, and be sure it is real.

How AERI sources and verifies hard-to-find parts

Most of the risk in the open market is not the parts. It is who you bought them from. Here is how AERI lowers that risk on every order.

1. You send an RFQ. Your request goes to a sourcing specialist, not a sales script, typically within a few hours during U.S. business hours.
2. We search a network we actually know. Our salespeople in the US, UK, Australia, and Asia work a global network of suppliers we have vetted since 1994. We do not buy from people we do not know. There are no garages and no mystery resellers in our supply chain.
3. Every part comes home to California. We do not drop-ship from our supplier to your dock. Parts route through our facility so they can be inspected before they reach you.
4. We inspect and test in our own lab. Many brokers do a quick visual check and ship the rest to a third-party test house when something looks off, which adds a week or more. AERI inspects in-house: X-ray, decapsulation, XRF analysis, and microscope inspection, plus blacktop and lead inspection for signs of remarking or prior use. Testing is scoped to what your application needs, from an IDEA-STD-1010 baseline to AS6171-aligned methods for higher-risk parts, under the governance of the AS6081 standard.
5. You get the parts and the paperwork. Every order ships with a documented inspection record. For military, aerospace, and customer-specific requirements, extended reports with photos of each condition are available.

Who AERI sources for

AERI is built for OEMs and subcontractors in industries where a counterfeit part or a line-down event is not an option:

• Aerospace and avionics
• Defense and military subcontractors
• Medical devices
• Industrial and semiconductor capital equipment
• Other high-reliability manufacturers

Because every part we ship is inspected and traceable, AERI is a fit for manufacturers who design and build their own products, not for resellers looking to flip inventory. If you are protecting a build, you are who we built this for.

IN GOOD COMPANY

For decades, OEMs and subcontractors in aerospace, defense, medical, and industrial have sourced through AERI, including teams at Lockheed Martin, Parker Hannifin, Schlumberger, and AeroVironment.

Why source from AERI

The open market is full of options. Few of them combine sourcing reach with in-house verification from professionals who had a hand in writing the international counterfeit standards.

• We helped write the rules. AERI's founder, Robb Hammond, is a founding member and former committee chair of the SAE AS6081 standard, created for the avoidance of counterfeit electronic components.
• The lab is in the building. Verification happens under our own roof, which saves the week or more it takes brokers who outsource their testing.
• Relationships, not listings. Since 1994, AERI has built its supplier network on names and track records, not anonymous online postings.
• Credentials your quality team will recognize. AS9120 aerospace certified. ANSI/ESD S20.20 certified. DLA QTSL qualified. IDEA member, following IDEA-STD-1010 for open-market receiving, with inspection performed by IDEA-ICE-3000 certified inspectors. AERI tests to AS6171 standards.

Frequently asked questions