Vendors

S3Suite helps you manage your manufacturing partners and streamline how you send production files to them.

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Your Vendor Directory

Every organization has its own private vendor directory. This is your list of manufacturing partners - the companies you work with to produce your hardware.

To add a vendor:

1. Go to Settings → Vendors (or access from the Manufacturing Suite)
2. Click Add Vendor
3. Fill in the vendor details:

- Company name - Contact person and email - Vendor category (see below) - Location, notes, and any other relevant info

1. Save

Your vendors are available across all projects in your organization.

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Vendor Categories

Vendors are organized by the type of service they provide:

Categorizing vendors correctly is important because the Send to Vendor feature uses categories to auto-suggest the right files.

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RND Square Approved Vendors

In addition to your own directory, S3Suite provides access to the RND Square Approved Vendor directory - a curated list of vetted manufacturing partners.

How to use it:

1. Go to the Approved Vendors section
2. Browse vendors by category, location, or capability
3. When you find one you want to work with, click Import to add them to your own vendor directory

Note: The Approved Vendors directory includes verified vendors curated by RND Square.

Tip: The approved vendor list is maintained and updated by RND Square. These vendors have been evaluated for quality, reliability, and responsiveness.

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Send to Vendor

When you need to send production files to a vendor, S3Suite automates the file selection and delivery.

Step-by-step:

1. Open a variant page in the Manufacturing Suite
2. Click Send to Vendor
3. Select the vendor type (e.g., PCB Manufacturer)
4. S3Suite automatically suggests the relevant files based on the vendor type:

- PCB vendor? Gerber files, drill files, stackup documents - Assembly house? Assembly drawings, BOM, pick-and-place files - Mechanical vendor? CAD files, STEP files, drawings

1. Review the suggested files - add or remove as needed
2. Select the vendor from your directory
3. Choose delivery method:

- Send via email - Files are sent directly to the vendor's email address - Export as ZIP - Download a packaged ZIP file to send manually

Tip: The auto-suggest feature works best when your files are properly categorized in the Engineering Suite. Take the time to organize files into the right sections (Hardware, Mechanical, etc.) and the Send to Vendor flow becomes nearly automatic.

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Vendor Send History

Every Send-to-Vendor batch is logged. Browse the history at /projects//vendor-sends (sidebar -> Vendor Sends) to see:

• Date of the send
• Vendor name + email
• Files included (BOM, Gerber, Schematic, Assembly Drawing, PCB Layout, Enclosure CAD, Mfg SOP, etc.)
• Method (email vs download)
• Status (sent / downloaded / failed)
• Sent by (the team member who triggered the send)

Filter by vendor or method to scope the list. The same page has a Send to Vendor button so a re-send is one click away.

Tip: Treat the history as your dispatch audit trail. When a vendor calls six months later asking "which version did we receive?", the entry shows the exact files included and the date. The files themselves were vault-snapshot-frozen at send time (see Manufacturing Vault).