In developing IT asset disposition strategies, companies often look to resale, redeployment, lease returns or recycling. Yet, as Knowledge Center contributor Robert Houghton discusses here, donations of fully refurbished corporate PCs yield far more value than these other IT asset disposition strategies.
Donating surplus computer equipment to help bridge the "digital divide" makes good business sense, yet it
remains an uncommon practice within many corporations due to a variety of
concerns. These concerns include data security, environmental liability,
software licensing transfers and the need for technical support, among others.
With the right approach, however, these barriers can be overcome. Donating
unused technology can be the most strategic disposition option available to
corporate IT departments.
Corporate donations of used PCs can address a serious problem in
our society: digital exclusion. At the end of 2009, 28 million American
households did not own a computer. People with computers, Internet access and
the skills to use both earn more and are better students, consumers and
employees. They're also more involved citizens. They put the commerce in
e-commerce while reducing the cost of serving them. In a digital world where
pulpwood-based telephone directories and newspapers are endangered species, how
will customers find us without Google?
There is tremendous potential for businesses to address this
problem by donating a fraction of the 40 million PCs that businesses replace
each year (of which, 75 percent are four years old or less, meaning most have
plenty of useful life remaining if properly refurbished). Yet only three
percent of replaced corporate PCs are donated and, unfortunately, many of those
are essentially dumped on charities without proper testing, repairs and
legally-licensed software.
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