Diffusing software-based innovation with a software factory approach for software development

Attaining high software throughput would be highly sought by countries targeting huge software exports like those of East Asia. Raising software throughput can be achieved through diffusing software-based innovations on a substantial scale with a robust, consistent and efficient means of producing quality and reliable software. A good approach for producing and diffusing such innovations would be adopting a software factory model in the software development process, developing software in a production-like manner and within a factory-like environment. In this paper, we developed a software factory model using a theoretical framework derived from industry practices, the existing literature and the traditional SMCRE communication model for diffusion of innovations. Grounded theory and action research were used to guide our research. The derived software factory model embodies the management and transfer of software-based innovations and describes software development best practices. Such a model can be used as benchmarking or be adopted as a blueprint for building software factories for diffusing software-based innovations.