Fostering innovative practices in commercial software engineering environments is a key challenge, which OPS will address. It will study the relationship and tension between open collaboration and measurable innovative outputs in software engineering. This project focuses on developing an open engineering methodology and maturity model for ECS in software engineering. This methodology incorporates an empirical investigation of how software development practices and efforts at the inter and intra-team level, as well as the inter-firm level, can be structured to optimise innovative outcomes.
The central idea behind Open Innovation is that in a world of widely distributed knowledge, companies cannot afford to rely exclusively on in-house innovation, but should also actively scout for and exploit the discoveries of others outside their own R&D structures. This concept challenges the dominant view where experts within the company invent and design innovative new products. However, shorter innovation cycles, the increased mobility of workers, the rising cost of industrial R&D, and a lack of resources have motivated a change in organisational innovation strategies towards a more open approach. The Open Innovation paradigm is gaining cultural acceptance in the consumer goods (Dodgson, Gann and Salter 2006) and automotive industries (Ili et al. 2010), while also attracting much interest from software developers (Whelan et al. 2010; West and Gallagher, 2006). Yet, with the software industry currently undergoing a fundamental change with the transition to agile and lean methods, there is a dearth of existing research that has explored how Open Innovation principles can be integrated with agile and lean methods in an effort to optimise software engineering capabilities. In addition, there is no research that we know of that investigates the implications of a more open approach for project management. Thus, exploring the notion of Open Innovation and its applicability and implications in a multiple project environment that employ agile methods is timely.
This project also focuses on how cloud computing systems can accelerate and improve open innovation within and between companies. This involves examining the key benefits and challenges of adopting and infusing cloud computing in organizations, as well as investigating how cloud vendors create value through sustainable business models. – See more at: http://www.lero.ie/project/ops#sthash.Blf4HRCW.dpuf
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