Value measurement on performance in Global Software Development An industry study on how R&D can influence "value for money"

GSD is a fact for internationally operating software engineering companies. The Economic Value Added (EVA) provides an overview of the cost and revenue of such projects and the R&D teams influence the cost position and revenue to a huge extent. The measurement of impact of R&D and it's influence on "value for money", however is a less ventured region. The actual outcome of a product in terms of value for money provides insights on the role of R&D (Research &Development) to increase revenue and reduce cost of the product. In any software engineering project this is difficult, but in a globally distributed setting measuring the value is even more important in order to make balanced decision considering for example short and long-term value creation or future development settings (e.g. how and where to distribute the development teams). This paper presents a model for measuring the value of a software product in software development projects. We have identified different factors, which should be taken into account when looking for the value of a software product, based on a literature review, available data within the company and several stakeholder interviews. These factors are quantitative (e.g. number of defects) and qualitative factors (e.g. innovation). Next, we mapped these factors to a value curve to show the value performance within a globally distributed software product development project. Additionally, we have applied these factors to a globally distributed project in order to understand the value evolution. The outcome of this paper is a model used in the case company to measure the value for money of a software product during development process as well as a first application of this model within industry context.