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Know what your PCBA should cost before you negotiate

  • Zollner Elektronik
  • Cicor
  • Datalink Electronics
  • Omega EMS
  • KEENFINITY
  • Garner Osborne
  • TQ Group
  • Sigmatron International
  • Asteelflash
  • Price Electronics
  • Nordes EMS
  • Connect Group
  • Indak Manufacturing
  • Liebherr
  • Fluidra
  • Knorr-Bremse
  • Leuze
  • Festool

Every cost driver of a board in one estimate

Build the should-cost from the BOM up

  • Live prices for every BOM line
  • PCB price from the board’s specification
  • Assembly and test cost per process

Compare supplier quotes with the should-cost

  • Quotes side by side with the should-cost
  • The gap per cost block
  • Open-book quotes normalized

Find the cost drivers while the design can still change

  • Top cost drivers per board
  • Scenarios for volume and region
  • Make-or-buy comparison

How should-costing works in Luminovo

  1. Upload the BOM and the PCB specification. Luminovo matches every line to a manufacturer part number and pulls live prices and lead times from 1,000+ distributors.

  2. Pick a manufacturing template for the lines and regions you want to compare. Luminovo adds placement, test, overhead, and margin to the material cost and shows the should-cost per board.

  3. Put each supplier quote next to the should-cost, see which block holds the gap, and take the numbers into the negotiation or the next design review.

All data in one place with 180+ partners and integrations

Why OEMs use Luminovo for should-costing

A woman at her laptop in front of a slate-blue wall
EMS B quote 18% above should-cost
Best quote
vs. should-cost
EMS C
+2.9%

Negotiate with numbers

Show a supplier where its quote sits above the should-cost, block by block, instead of arguing about the total.

STM32G431CBT6Live
Arrow6 wks$4.08Best
DigiKeyIn stock$4.12+1%
MouserIn stock$4.24+4%
412 lines priced live

Live market prices

Material cost comes from real-time prices and lead times for every BOM line, not from last year’s price list.

An engineer at a workbench inspecting a circuit board
Design review · rev C
PCB 6 to 4 layers−$1.10
Alternate for U3−$0.62

Cost in the design review

Engineers see the cost impact of a part or board change while the design is still open. Up to 80% of a product’s lifecycle cost is set during design.

Assembly cost · Line 2costdata®
SMT placement$3.10
THT and selective soldering$1.30
Handling and packaging$1.20
Labor rate: Germany, 2026

Costing with costdata® benchmarks

costdata® reference data for processes, machine rates, and regional labor works inside Luminovo, so assembly and overhead rest on benchmarks.

A woman at a sunset window looking at her laptop
3 regions compared

Make-or-buy and re-shoring

Compare regions and manufacturing options before you move production. Leuze found 17% lower production cost for a sensor project and brought its production back to Germany.

PCBA-4471 rev C · sourcingSame BOM
Should-cost material$31.80Baseline
Purchase order PO-1187$31.20Ordered
PO 1.9% below should-cost

The same data as sourcing

The should-cost runs on the BOM your buyers source from, so the estimate and the later purchase use the same parts and prices.

Trusted by 400+ electronics teams worldwide

1 of 6
“Once you get the configuration done, the BOM import, the scrubbing, the scrap calculation, the auto-sourcing — it is so easy that you feel like you're doing something wrong.”
Matthew GrabanskiSupply Chain Manager, Nova Engineering
See all case studies

FAQs

Explore all the most frequently asked questions.

Still have questions?

See your own BOM in Luminovo in a 30-minute demo.

Request a demo
What is should-costing?

Should-costing estimates what a part or an assembly should cost from its materials, processes, labor, overhead, and margin, instead of taking a supplier’s price as given. For a PCBA, that covers the price of every BOM line, the bare board, assembly, and test.

How does Luminovo calculate the should-cost of a PCBA?

Luminovo prices every BOM line with live distributor data, adds the PCB price from the board’s specification, and calculates assembly and test from the manufacturing template you choose. Overhead and margin complete the estimate, so you see the cost per board and per block.

Where does the cost data come from?

Part prices and lead times come from Luminovo’s distributor integrations in real time. For processes, machine rates, and regional labor, Luminovo works with costdata® reference data.

How do I compare supplier quotes with the should-cost?

Import or collect the quotes in Luminovo, and they appear next to the should-cost, split into the same blocks. Open-book quotes are normalized, so you compare like with like and see which block holds the gap.

When should OEMs start should-costing?

In the concept phase. Up to 80% of a product’s lifecycle cost is set during design, and Leuze now has its electronics cost within 24 hours instead of weeks, before the design is final.

Who uses should-costing at an OEM?

Cost and value engineers, strategic buyers, category managers, and hardware engineers. Procurement negotiates with the should-cost; engineering uses it to choose parts and board options in design reviews.

Bring a BOM and see it in Luminovo

In a 30-minute demo, we’ll run one of your own BOMs and show you prices, lead times, and risk on your parts.