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Commercial Item and Commercially Available


Whynot

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What if anything is the distinction in the FAR between something this is required to be a “commercial item” and something that is required to be “commercially available”? It appears that “commercially available” is frequently linked to COTS items but not always. If there is a standalone requirement for an item to be “commercially available” without the reference to COTS does the item still need to meet the “commercially available” COTS definition or can it just meet the “commercial item” definition or some other defintion?

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Not sure if this helps.

To be a commercial item, the item need only meet the definition of "commercial item" at FAR 2.101. That definition includes items of a type "customarily used by the general public..." and having been sold... or offered for sale to the general public.  Inherently, that means the item needs to be available to the public to meet the definition of a commercial item at paragraph (1), unless one of the other types of commercial items described in the other paragraphs within the definition is being acquired and doesn't require availability (e.g. paragraph (3)(ii)).  The term COTS is not used in the definition.

The definition of "COTS item" not only requires the supply item be a commercial item (as defined at FAR 2.101), but it also must meet two other elements of the definition.  One of these elements requires it to be "sold in substantial quantities in the commercial marketplace," meaning it would need to be commercially available.  The term "commercially available" is even part of the acronym "COTS." 

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Whynot,

The FAR provides two separate definitions for each term (though the term you use of "commercially available" is used in the FAR as "commercially available off the shelf" (COTS))...see FAR 2.101 and FAR 12.103.  Are you asking about the distinction between those two definitions in the FAR or someone/somewehere else's attempted distinction?

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8 hours ago, Vern Edwards said:

Commercially available means available from more than one source that is not a government entity.

Interesting. I never thought of it as concerning the source of supply. I thought commercially available meant sold or available to other than government entities (e.g. available in the commercial market place vs government marketplace).

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Guest Vern Edwards
7 hours ago, Matthew Fleharty said:

Vern,

Just out of curiousity, where is your definition from?

My head. I found no official definition, so I defined it.

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