So wouldn't the suggestion become to negotiate a long term agreement at a set rate so that the owner gets a secured low price on the equipment and on the maintenance? I don't disagree that an owner should be careful to not go down a path that would give them a poor future, but there are other ways than ignoring the cost effective OEMs. You can always contract with a company to mitigate the future risk. You can guarantee that service tools will be available for purchase if you don't like their service, set the maintenance price at the time of elevator purchase, guarantee that all parts are available for resale, and so on.

I don't hear people complain as much when I have to go to MCE every time a slight modification needs to be done. At that point they can charge me whatever they want the same way an OEM can. No matter what you do you are locked in with a vendor. If it isn't KONE/Otis/TKE/Schindler it is MCE/VMI/SmartRise/EC. There is always someone you MUST go to if certain things happen on the equipment regardless of if you classify them as OEM. If we are telling our customers any differently we are misleading them.