It's kind of funny around this time of year when some researchers have $10,000 in their budget they need to spend, and they want to 'gift' us with some GPU's.
That was definitely one of the weirdest things of working in academia IT: “hey. Can you buy me a workstation that’s as close to $6,328.45 as it is possible to get, and can you do it by 4pm?”
Same thing happens in the government sector here (US). If you don't spend all of the budget you requested last year, you might not get it next year. There is an entire ecosystem of bottom-feeder GSA companies that apparently exist to spend year-end money that would otherwise go to 'waste'.