AN ANALYSIS OF THE INFLUENCES CAUSED BY A SOFTWARE ECOSYSTEM IN ORGANIZATIONAL STRATEGY

Abstract

Time-to-market imposes pressure on software companies. To meet customers' needs, the organization of software business as independent units might not enable enterprises to provide everything the customer wants. To overcome this problem, enterprises act in Software Ecosystems (SECO), so that there are strong interactions among participants aimed at meeting market demands. In this new configuration, different parts of the supplying activities are divided among the participants, so as to increase return on investment, share costs of innovation and research and development (R&D). Although a SECO represents opportunities, it brings challenges, risks and threats as well. In order to thrive in a SECO, organizations need to understand the role they play in the network and strive for the best way to behave. To support this process, it is important to model the whole ecosystem and the interactions among the players. By analyzing the SECO in which the organization is involved, it is possible to conduct an analysis of the environment of the organization, so that it is possible to see the influence it has on organizational strategy. Business Process Management (BPM) can assist on this analysis. This work presents concepts, definitions and issues that are exposed in the literature concerning Software Ecosystems and identifies the impacts it has on the strategy of the Ecosystem leader. Two modeling techniques are used, one presented in the SECO literature and other used in BPM Context. A real world example concerning a Project Management software is presented and analyzed to illustrate the study.