Proprietary Vs. Non-Proprietary.
You buy a new Ford. Would you take it to a chevy dealer for service? Or Vice Versa?
Now...Ford, Chevy, Chrysler, etc...Have spent 100's of millions of R&D money to utilize the latest and greatest technology in their proucts. Hard for a couple of guys building something in the garage to compete with.
Most of the Non-Proprietary equipment mentioned above is at least 10 to 15 years behind, technoligically, over the major OEM's.
The Non-Proprietary buzz word is a favorite of consultants, since they don't have to know anything about elevator equipment except that it's Non-Proprietary.
And having the sacred Non-Proprieatary title means you can get ANYONE...Qualified or not, to come in take care of your elevator and expect full factory support.
Let's see what Non-Proprietary really means.
You can put in an MCE for instance. You can then get ANYBODY off the street to take care of it. Now that Anybody can get a "Gold" level of support for the guy off the street, but for a price. Or if you pass up the maintenace package, you will be charged by the hour for every call your guy off the street, makes for a phone call for factory support.
Now...How about Swift?
Owned by TK. Yeah they claim to be NON-Proprietary. Same thing as MCE. Every call for support cost's MOOLA. And for those living in Canada, I'm sure you've already figured out the word NON-Proprieatary has several levels of interpretation.
There's just a few other players in the non-proprietary market. Virginia control (A PLC based control), Elevator Controls (Basically Motion type stuff). And a few others.
Propretary does not strictly mean exactly that either. TK, takes care of plenty of other PROPRIETARY equipment. As well as others of the big 4 taking care of competitors proprietary equipment.
If you do the research, cleanly reverse engineer you competitors equipment, nothing is proprietary.
Why others rag on "Proprieatary controls" is beyond me. The OEM's are the guys that brought you all the innovation you have seen in the past and will continue to see in the future.
