Reverse Engineering

• Reverse engineering has its origins in the analysis of hardware for commercial or military advantage. However, the reverse engineering process in itself is not concerned with creating a copy or changing the artifact in some way; it is only an analysis in order to deduce design features from products with little or no additional knowledge about the procedures involved in their original production.
• In some cases, the goal of the reverse engineering process can simply be a re-documentation of legacy systems.
• Even when the product reverse engineered is that of a competitor, the goal may not be to copy them, but to perform competitor analysis and improvements.
• Value engineering is a related activity also used by businesses. It involves de-constructing and analyzing products, but the objective is to find opportunities for cost cutting.