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AI agents & procurement

Get-Me-Quote Agent

AI agents that request PCB and PCBA quotes from suppliers in China, manage the bilingual conversation and compare every offer like for like.

Client
Electronics hardware company
Area
PCB & PCBA sourcing
Status
Core built; live supplier pilot next
Practice
Contract R&DAlso: Automation & Digital Twins

The challenge

Sourcing PCBs and assembled boards from China is slow, manual work: finding capable suppliers, sending RFQs one by one and chasing replies across a language barrier. Quotes differ in format, currency and scope, so weighing one turnkey supplier against separate fabrication, parts and assembly is hard to do fairly.

What we built

An AI sourcing assistant built as a multi-agent pipeline, with a choice of AI model for each stage, including locally hosted ones. It reads each board’s Gerber, drill, BOM and centroid files into a reviewed fact sheet, checks parts with distributors, shortlists suppliers and sends RFQs from the company mailbox, then manages each conversation in English and Chinese.

Guardrails built in

  • Approval first: nothing reaches a supplier without the buyer’s approval.
  • Hard budget caps: AI spend and outreach are capped per month and per project.
  • No guesswork: facts, prices and translations link to their source; unknowns are flagged, never filled in.
  • The buyer decides: the system never places orders, pays or signs.

Every quote compared

Offers are compared like for like on landed cost, with shared charges, exchange rates and lead times, across turnkey and split options, then ranked with gaps and uncertainty shown.

Fig. 04 — How it worksSchematic
Board files go into the Get-Me-Quote Agent, whose AI agents build a fact sheet, check parts, shortlist suppliers, verify contacts and prepare bilingual RFQs. Once the buyer approves, the RFQs go to suppliers in China in their own language; their quotes come back and are ranked on landed cost, with an unquoted freight charge flagged rather than guessed. The buyer uploads the files, approves what is sent, and chooses and places the order. BOARD FILES IN GET-ME-QUOTE AGENT PREPARES SUPPLIERS IN CHINA OFFERS COMPARED Gerber Drill BOM Centroid AI agents Model chosen per stage Fact sheet from files BOM & parts checks Supplier shortlist Verified contacts Bilingual RFQs AB CD Turnkey PCBAQuote received PCB fabricatorQuestion, then quote Assembly houseQuote received Turnkey PCBAFollow-up, then quote 中文 中文 中文 EN Landed cost per option Split · fab B, parts, assembly C 1 Lowest Turnkey · A 2 Turnkey · D ? Freight not quoted: flagged Quoted Freight Unknown Uploads board files Approves what is sent Chooses and places the order Key decisions stay with the buyer; every action is logged

Swipe sideways to see the whole schematic

What it delivers

Quotes without legwork

Supplier research, RFQs and follow-ups prepared by the system.

No language barrier

Suppliers approached in their language; numbers and part IDs checked in translation.

Like-for-like choices

Turnkey and split options compared on landed cost, with gaps flagged.

Safe by design

Approvals, hard budget caps and a full audit trail.

  • Multi-agent AI
  • Model choice per stage
  • Gerber, drill & BOM analysis
  • Distributor parts checks
  • Supplier research
  • Email RFQs
  • English–Chinese translation
  • Landed-cost comparison
  • Approvals & audit trail
  • Budget caps

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Still running on paper or manual checks?

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Start a conversation write@balkhi.tech · +92 324 4444299