Original URL: https://www.theregister.com/2001/04/18/letsbuyit_brands_own_pcs/

Letsbuyit brands own PCs

They'll be called Ants

By Robert Blincoe

Posted in On-Prem, 18th April 2001 11:10 GMT

Letsbuyit.com, the group buying etailer, is launching its own brand PCs. The systems will be called Ants.

PC manufacturer Centerprise is building the machines. The company already makes Advent machines for the Dixons Group, Bonsai PCs for Tempo, and Vulcan computers for John Lewis.

Letsbuyit very nearly went titsup in January and had to suspend trading. After laying off some staff, getting some extra funding, and ditching some lines, it returned to business in February.

"We've homed in on the products that are most sought after by members and reduced down the sheer number of suppliers we will work with," said CEO John Palmer, in February.

Centerprise MD Rafi Razzak thought the Letsbuyit concept was a good one but admitted he wouldn't have bought anything from it first time round. "But now its more interested in establishing the loyalty of customers," he said.

It could be unlikely that the Letsbuyit/Centerprise relationship involves build to order. During a Register visit to Centerprise's factory Razzak conceded that it wasn't practical to do this kind of production with a larger number of PC models. "There's only about four SKUs [stock keeping units] you can handle building to order. So you make the others [models] prohibitively expensive." ®

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