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COTS vs. Custom / Build vs. Buy: Decision Tree and Best Practices

Reference Information:

I work for a company with a large investment in SAP, and we also have dozens of large .NET systems (mainly for engineering systems) and the Java platform (mainly for external web applications). So we have big development stores in ABAP, C # and Java EE.

Question:

In short, We need a better way to determine when Commercial, Off The Shelf (COTS) software should be used, and when we should use our own developers.

Criteria:

I would like to build a decision tree based on best practices to help with this issue.

At the highest level, Jeff Atwood's report sums it up well: The best code contains no code at all

A little deeper, I would like to see criteria such as:

Is a COTS system available that meets most requirements? (If so, the COTS system might be a good option: (Avoid reinventing the wheel))

  • If so, is there a fully open API available? (This is necessary for integration / customization)
  • If so, is the source code available? (This is important for deep integration / customization)

Is the system designed to meet the core business function / create a competitive advantage? (If so, custom development might be a good option: See Joel Sposky's: In Defense of Un-Invented Syndrome-here )

  • If so, will custom development allow code reuse in the future / other system? (There are many benefits to reusing existing code)

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