Commercial, off-the-shelf (COTS) is a term for software or hardware, generally technology or computer products, that are ready-made and available for sale, lease, or license to the general public. They are often used as alternatives to in-house developments or one-off government-funded developments. The use of COTS is being mandated across many government and business programs, as they may offer significant savings in procurement and maintenance. However, since COTS software specifications are written by external sources, government agencies are sometimes wary of these products because they fear that future changes to the product will not be under their control.

“Commercial off-the-shelf.” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. 15 Feb 2008, 05:04 UTC. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 21 Feb 2008

So yes, while government agencies and original equipment manufacturers (OEM) have in recent years looked to COTS products to save development costs (i.e. engineering cost) and to increase time-to-market, many are now concerned for a variety of reasons. The issues include:

• Performance & function does not meet expectations or needs
• Quality
• Changes (customizations) are costly and time-consuming
• Lifecycle management of product
• Little to no differentiation in market (end product is similar to everyone else’s)
• Support

Part of the problem has to do with the initial decision making process in regard the product – often referred to as the “BUILD vs BUY” decision. What is often not recognized early in the development cycle is that the situation is not that simple. In reality there is a spectrum of development choices that spans from “pure build” to “pure buy”. In between are hybrid scenarios that combine both internal and external development and production. Thus expectations are not met if what was thought to be a “pure buy” situation actually is a semi-custom development.

The spectrum of “BUILD vs BUY” can be described as follows:

Commodity COTS

Generally available (GA) commodity COTS product with no customization (true “off the shelf”). Supplier development and testing. OEM conducts acceptance test.

Pre-GA COTS

PRE-GA COTS products are products in development that will be marketed as COTS products, with OEM being first customer. OEM conducts acceptance test.

Customized COTS

OEM requirements applied to a COTS product. OEM requirements may be applied to standard product, or supplier may support separate product/load line for OEM. Supplier development and testing. OEM conducts acceptance test.

Full Custom

Custom product acquired from outside partner, solely or primarily based on OEM requirements. Supplier development and testing. OEM conducts acceptance test.

Sourced

OEM in-house high-level design, outside partner does low-level design, development, and test. OEM conducts acceptance tests on the sourced product.

Built

OEM in-house design, development, test. OEM in-house manufacture or contract manufacture.

So before making a “build vs. buy” decision it is important to fully understand where in the spectrum the actual situation really is. A “pure build” or a “pure buy” decision is often not the overall best choice, but given the product and market situation, something in the middle will most likely result in a superior product. And understanding and considering this upfront will reduce disappointment and result in delivering a quality product in a timely fashion.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 21st, 2008 at 6:19 pm and is filed under Other. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.