Critical Success Factors of exploration and production software ecosystems

By definition, the soul of software ecosystems is synergistic cooperation. As the oil and gas industry is perceived to be closed and conservative, this makes the software ecosystems in the industry unique and the main motivation for this paper. The literature currently available on software ecosystems does not cover the oil and gas exploration & production (E&P) industry and there has been limited research in this field. This paper investigates the most critical factors that make a software ecosystem successful in the E&P industry. The research was conducted on software ecosystems in the E&P industry. The sample of the research consisted of the platform providers, third-party developers and E&P companies. Through a literature review, a comprehensive software ecosystem strategy assessment model was identified and the factors from that model were evaluated. These factors are analyzed and discussed in the paper and presented from the perspective of various players of the ecosystem. Based on the results from the interviews, discussions and data analysis, a new Critical Success Factors model is designed. This model identifies the influencing factors (that affect the critical success factors) and the resulting factors (that exist because of the critical success factors).