While trying to improve your company’s IT system, you may have come across the term hardware asset management. If you’re wondering what hardware asset management is, this article will detail how it works and provide examples of how it fits into business operations. Read on to get all the details.
What Is Hardware Asset Management?
Hardware asset management is the process of tracking, maintaining, purchasing, replacing, and disposing of physical computer hardware in a business. Each of these elements comes with detailed step-by-step procedures that keep IT hardware in top condition and your company performing at its best.
The main goals of hardware asset management are to save companies money by getting the most value out of assets and create a more organized system to manage all these pieces of computer equipment. This process requires consistent monitoring, and if your company is struggling to collect all the data you need to get the value out of your hardware assets, partnering with a team that specializes in IT asset management may be beneficial.
The Process of Hardware Asset Management
Hardware management typically uses a five-step process to manage computer hardware throughout its lifecycle. This process goes as follows:
- Take inventory of all hardware assets on hand and record them in a spreadsheet or asset management software.
- Purchase additional IT hardware as needed to fulfill company needs.
- Deploy newly purchased hardware and ensure it is operating at full functionality.
- Maintain IT hardware regularly to prevent malfunctions and common issues.
- Replace, sell, and dispose of old assets as they age and are no longer working right.
By following this process, IT teams or partners can effectively manage all hardware assets on hand and keep daily operations within a business running smoothly.
What Are Hardware Assets Examples
You may be wondering exactly what would be considered hardware assets in a business. This will typically be physical computing equipment and other hardware used daily in operations. Some examples of specific hardware assets are:
- Desktop/laptop computers
- Tablets
- Phones
- Hard drives
- SIM cards
- Motherboards
- Server units
- Switches
- Hubs
- Routers
- Modems
Each hardware asset is vital to a business. Even one malfunction in a piece of hardware can impact the entire system. It can even affect the functionality of other assets, like software assets.
What Is the Difference Between Hardware and Software Assets?
The main difference between hardware and software assets is that hardware is physical computer equipment, and software is digital.
When you maintain hardware assets, they may need more physical repairs. They also take up physical space within a business which needs to be accounted for appropriately. Working with a partner like Multiply can help solve for these roadblocks, as we offer storage solutions for our clients and have an in-house repair team.
On the other hand, software assets will require digital repairs or troubleshooting if it has issues. It also only takes up digital space in a business environment.
Many companies split up how they manage these two sets of assets due to their different needs in repair and maintenance.
Examples of Hardware Asset Management
Here are a couple of examples to give you a better idea of how hardware asset management works.
Example #1
For this first example, let’s say that a company wants to replace old desktops with laptops that will allow employees more flexibility in where they work.
The IT team would ask for approval and a budget for what they can invest in the new laptops. They would then work with vendors to negotiate a price for a high-quality laptop model and additionally a price to try to sell old desktops for the best possible value. Selling the old desktops to get value back would help be able to get higher quality laptops as a replacement.
Once the new laptops are purchased, they can be inventoried and deployed in business operations. IT professionals will work to set them up so they are functional and don’t have any issues upon first use.
Once the new laptops are set up and working well, they can remove old desktops from daily operations and sell them to a vendor. Then, the new laptops will be consistently monitored as part of the asset management system.
Example #2
For this second example, let’s say an IT team wants to implement hubs that make the networking system in a business more efficient.
Upon analysis that the company’s computing system could benefit from hubs, the IT team would ask for approval and a budget to purchase and implement this new system.
Once they have approval, they would negotiate with vendors and find the appropriate equipment that will get the best results.
Next, the equipment would be appropriately deployed and set up. This would include ensuring it is functional and doing everything possible to avoid disrupting business operations.
Lastly, the hubs and units involved in the new networking system would be inventoried and monitored regularly as part of the overall hardware management system.
How Multiply Can Help
As you can tell from the examples in this article, a lot goes into hardware asset management. And managing hardware assets is only one piece of the puzzle. Your business also likely has software, cloud-based, and fixed assets that must be managed with the same level of care.
If you’re looking for a partnership to get an effective asset management system going, Multiply can help. Multiply is a team of IT consultants that partners with businesses to help with IT asset and data management. We help you put streamlined systems in place to avoid the frustration and confusion that can arise when managing IT equipment.
To learn more, you can contact us today! We’re here to answer any questions and provide more information on how we can help with your IT needs.
