ICECCS'B7 Industrial Track process improvement experiments

Abstract

Today, approximately 70% of all software developed in Europe is produced in the non-IT sectors of the economy. This makes software a key topic for the whole European industry, with strategic significance for global competitiveness. Furthermore, as the information age develops, software is destined to become even more pervasive and transparent across industrial sectors and user segments. The growing dependence of modern industry upon software products has been accompanied by the acceptance of software development into the elite of strategic business management issues. The efficiency and the quality with which software is produced is having a greater and greater impact on the profitability of the companies and on their ability to meet customer needs. Industrial success is now increasingly linked to an organisation's ability to produce software efficiently with consistently high quality. It is within this context, that ESSI (European System and Software Initiative) is supporting a set of preparatory, support and transfer activities, applied to the software technology domain of ESPRIT. These activities are concerned with the adoption of best practice in organisations working in any economic sector (both IT and non-IT sectors), which have software development capabilities and which regard software as an important aspect of their business. Any organisation in any sector involved in writing software may benefit from the adoption of best practice.