The Use of COTS in Defense Acquisition Programs: A Research Synthesis and Framework

Abstract

The DOD faces pressure to sustain its competitive advantages in national security. Enduring budget pressures, a record-long high operations tempo, the blitzing pace of technology, and adversaries that are leveraging commercial technology compound the challenge. The adoption of COTS products into defense acquisitions has been offered to help meet these challenges. A literature review of 62 sources was conducted with the objectives of better understanding COTS product implementation performance. It explored: (1) characteristics of the research, (2) policies, laws, regulations, and directives that govern the use of COTS, (3) the known barriers to COTS implementations, (4) the known success factors to COTS implementations, (5) the recommendations have previously been made with respect to COTS implementations, and (6) recommendations for more timely and more effective COTS implementations. From the literature emerged a framework of COTS product usage and a scale to measure COTS product appropriateness that should help to guide COTS product adoption decisions and to help manage COTS product implementations ex post.