Conference room pilot (CRP) is a term used in software procurement and software acceptance testing. A CRP may be used during the selection and implementation of a software application in an organisation or company.

The purpose of the conference room pilot is to validate a software application against the business processes of end-user

End-user

Economics and commerce define an end user as the person who uses a product. The end user or consumer may differ from the person who purchases the product...

s of the software, by allowing end-users to use the software to carry out typical or key business processes using the new software. A commercial advantage of a conference room pilot is that it may allow the customer to prove that the new software will do the job (meets business requirements and expectations) before committing to buying the software, thus avoiding buying an inappropriate application. The term is most commonly used in the context of 'out of the box

Out of the box

Out of the box is the term used to denote items, functionalities, or features that do not require any additional installation. In addition to being used for tangible products, the phrase is often used in a less literal sense for software, which may not be distributed in an actual box but offer...

' (OOTB) or 'commercial off-the-shelf

Commercial off-the-shelf

In the United States, Commercially available Off-The-Shelf is a Federal Acquisition Regulation term defining a nondevelopmental item of supply that is both commercial and sold in substantial quantities in the commercial marketplace, and that can be procured or utilized under government contract...

' software (COTS).

Compared to user acceptance testing

Although a conference room pilot shares some features of user acceptance testing (UAT), it should not be considered a testing process – it validates design or solution fit for purpose at a higher level than functional testing.

Shared features of CRP and UAT include:

• End-to-end business processes are used as a "business input" for both
• Functionality demonstrations
• Non-functional validation(e.g. performance testing)

Differences between a conference room pilot and a formal UAT:

• It is attempting to identify how well the application meets business needs, and identify gaps, whilst still in the design phase of the project
• There is an expectation that changes will be required before acceptance of the solution
• The software is ‘on trial’ and may be rejected completely in favour of another solution.