The Relationship Between Business Model Experimentation and Technical Debt

Abstract

Abstract. The use of lean software development methodology and business model experimentation has become popular in software companies in recent years. Business model experimentation is used to validate assumptions made on a product from real customers before the actual product is created. A minimum viable product is used to test the business model by gathering and measuring customer feedback. However, in many cases creating a minimum viable product requires the development team to take shortcuts and workarounds in the product. This phenomenon in software development is called 'technical debt', where companies trade long-term software quality to short-term gain in time-tomarket. We investigated four software companies and conducted nine interviews to understand the relationship between business model experimentation and technical debt. The goal was to study how business model experimentation is affecting to technical debt. The results showed that business model experimentation has a clear relationship to technical debt.

Software startup engineering: A systematic mapping study

“…Three primary studies that have identified software engineering management are [73,56,74]. However, these papers primarily focus on software engineering processes [73,56] and software quality [74].…”

“…Three primary studies that have identified software engineering management are [73,56,74]. However, these papers primarily focus on software engineering processes [73,56] and software quality [74]. Although the Hunter-gatherer cycle presented by Nguyen-Duc et al [56] presents how startups can handle the https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jss.2018.06.043 dynamic evolution of product-market fit, which is part of both business experimentation and customer development, it is primarily focused towards software engineering processes in startups.…”

“…Steve McConnell showed that technical debt can be divided into intentional and unintentional debt [75]. Shortcuts can lead to the accumulation of intentional technical debt, while unintentional technical debt can happen when business model experimentation is leaved out [74]. No matter how good the idea may seem, not validating the idea with customers could lead to the development of unnecessary features.…”

Towards Effective Technical Debt Decision Making in Software Startups

“…Yli-Huumo et al [19] study the relationship between business model experimentation and TD, in order to explore if conducting the business model experimentation impacts the amount of TD incurred. The business model experimentation is a technique used to validate assumptions made about a product with real customers, before creating the actual product.…”

Product Innovation through Internal Startup in Large Software Companies: A Case Study

“…The literature of corporate entrepreneurship shows that to generate revenue streams and values for shareholders, large companies are engaged in either internal startup (or internal corporate venture [30]) or external startup (or external corporate venture) [31], or both. external startup usually includes joint venturing (e.g.…”