Many organizations have decided to automate their quality management system (QMS) or upgrade their currently automated QMS. Quality management tends to involve significant numbers of documents, which automated systems are especially efficient at creating, accessing, tracking, updating, and reporting. Because QMS requirements are often similar from one organization to another, a number of QMS software products are commercially available. 

In general, acquiring a commercial QMS is less expensive, less risky, and takes less time to implement than building your own QMS software. Those who have experienced or seen others experience software development know how difficult it can be. Even mature software development organizations frequently find that developing software fails to deliver expected benefits, despite when—as so often happens— it also takes longer and costs more than estimated.

Moreover, more organizations have reduced or gotten out of doing software development. Consequently, they no longer have the technical and management capabilities to develop their own QMS. Many follow a strategy of relying on third parties for some or all of the software they need to run their organizations.

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