As a consequence, though, the initial price of the equipment is going to go up. And then they'll be complaining that they can't even afford to get started.
I honestly think they should be able to get it repaired wherever they want. But it's not actually going to fix all their problems, it's just going to shift them around.
What would be the arguments for this price increase?
Because if they are factoring in servicing into the price of the equipment, then I think that would be even more serious case of planned obsolescence (if we can even use that term here...). Maybe then someone will pick up that inefficiency and develop a new brand of affordable equipment - if the US gov. would allow that of course.
One of the questions is how profitable is the manufacturing, sell, and maintenance of farm equipment (for example)? Maybe some of the wallets redistribute between buyers, sellers, and maintenance firms - maybe not if the economics are poor. If the profits were to come mostly from maintenance, then pricing could not just stay where it is (absent new market entries creating downward pressure).
I just can't wrap my head around that.
I mean, if that was the case then probably asset depreciation/wear should be reframed in accounting/finance, because not only they lose value but they have a added cost (arguably planned, since it's part of the pricing structure and business model of that equipment).
In the end you're just paying to rent parts that will need to be replaced and paid for, because the equipment won't work without it and they can only be serviced by X player... farming equipment became just extremely large printers, where buy them cheaper to then get looted on refills?
> I just can't wrap my head around that.
How do you think the automobile industry works? Supposedly most dealerships make their money in the service centre.
With complex modern machinery, maintenance and repair is something that really matters (downtime costs money) and depending on the equipment, it is something where the manufacturer has a real edge, for example, in large industrial machinery. Not talking about some trivial upkeep here.
The asset depreciation/wear side would only be with the buyer, not the seller. So if the buyer where show a balance sheet, then maybe there is something to argue about - not sure what farms do or don't do from an accounting perspective (or need to do). Not everyone needs a balance sheet drawn up.
This is not too dissimilar from selling a gaming console at a loss/at cost and making the money on the games, I reckon.
That's why documentation, schematics, software should be accessible by anyone who wants to fix this type of equipment. It's the difference between a mechanic going up to your farm, plug the equipment to the PC, run the diagnostic, replace part, instead of you have to call a truck, pay for the shipping of the equipment to the closest authorized dealer, and then have it looked up -> this second options costs way more time/money.
But if things are getting so complex you need to haul equipment that weight tons back to the factory, then is that complexity sustainable at all?
However, for some machinery (might not be in farming) it will need real training so even with schematics, docs etc. we do not want untrained people to fix it. These people might not work for the manufacturer, but repairing is "gated" in a sense (repairing commercial aircraft, for example). As far as onsite vs. shipping is concerned, I think with really heavy equipment most maintenance will be onsite as shipping makes no sense at some point/transport is next to impossible.
If the business were profitable without the lock-in, other players would be competing with John Deere on this. Nobody is, that tells me the lock-in is needed to sustain the business.