Final Thesis: Strategic Open-Sourcing in Companies: Why and How?
Abstract: Software Companies of the past were keen to develop proprietary software and to hold all boundaries of the software within their control. As open-source software gains momentum and acceptance across the industry, companies start understanding the opportunities underlying it and take strategic decisions to open-source some of their software components to gain business value. This paper presents various intents behind which a company can open-source strategically, a best practice workflow and a list of other best practices derived from using a case study research methodology across four global companies. The list of best practices regarding the categories ‘People’, ‘Process’, ‘Policy’, ‘Tooling’ and ‘Artifact’ across the domains of Open-source Advocacy, Software development and Project Management were derived using qualitative data analysis. They are presented as best practice patterns which can be utilized by software companies in dealing with challenges during strategic open-sourcing.
Keywords: Strategic open-sourcing, open-source software, open-source advocacy, open-sourcing process, best practice, software development management, external workforce, innovation
PDFs: Master Thesis, Work Description
Reference: Gayathery Sathya. Strategic Open-Sourcing in Companies: Why and How?. Master Thesis, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg: 2018.