How to run a successful software business.
4/5/2004
A primer on software industry strategy, management, entrepreneurship, and, perhaps the most fundamental activity: software development. The author uses examples from his vast professional experience and case studies to help the reader understand the sometimes-convoluted market, and offers useful suggestions and strategies for success. Noting that there are the three types of software companies—product, service, and hybrid—Cusumano offers this advice: "The primary focus of software products companies…is to sell a fully standardized product—packaged software." He also writes that "software services companies [should] sell services, broadly defined, mainly to other firms," while hybrid companies' focus should be to "sell a mixture of products and services, with maintenance upgrades or special enhancements that must be supported in the future." The book's target audiences are managers in the software field, management-ambitious programmers, and potential software entrepreneurs. Cusumano is the Sloan Management Review Distinguished Professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, and one of the world's leading authorities on software development and the management of software companies.—Wendy Guild Swearingen