The customer organisation will invariably contain an acquisition component (the
acquirer) which will be responsible for acquiring the system on
behalf of the users in accordance with the user requirements.
The acquirer's role begins at the start of Conceptual Design
where the users' requirements are gathered and ends at the
beginning of the Utilisation Phase once the system is introduced
into service and the users assume responsibility for the system.
The role of the acquirer will depend on the type
of customer organisation: some acquirers will perform all of the
activities in acquisition (Conceptual Design, Preliminary Design, Detailed Design and
Development, Construction and/or Production), while others may just complete Conceptual
Design and outsource the remaining activities to a prime contractor through a contract. The contractor is
therefore normally responsible for the Preliminary Design, Detailed Design and
Development, Construction and/or Production activities finishing with acceptance by the
acquirer at a Formal Qualification Review. In some cases, the
contractor's role may begin earlier in Conceptual Design
and/or may continue into support arrangements during the Utilisation Phase.
Other topics in our resources on Systems Engineering related to Contractor include: