Dictionary of Procurement Terms

An integrated management tool that examines cost, progress, and the original project schedule to determine variances from planned profiles. Its purpose is to allow for the prediction, with some degree of certainty, actual cost and schedule at completion of a project, given cost and progress at certain intervals of contract performance.

Something of value paid as a pledge to bind an agreement or contract, typically money paid by a seller to a buyer.

A financial ratio calculated by dividing net income after taxes by the number of shares of common stock outstanding. (Business, 2002)

A right held by a person to some limited and specified use of land held by another person.

A company with an on-line auction site that enables people and businesses to buy and sell goods and services on a local, national, and international basis. Founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995, it transacts billions of dollars in gross merchandise sales over the Internet.

An organization of nations formed to promote the free movement of resources and products among its members and to create common economic policies. (Schiller, 2000)