DevServOps: DevOps For Product-Oriented Product-Service Systems
Anas Dakkak, Jan Bosch, Helena Holmström Olsson
TL;DR
DevOps is well established for web applications but faces context-specific challenges in software‑intensive product‑oriented PSS where customers operate the product and services are integral. The study adopts a two‑year participant observation at a telecom vendor and proposes Development‑Services‑Operations (DevServOps), a service‑driven extension that acts as glue between development and customer operations with two directed flows. The contributions include a formal DevServOps concept, empirical insights into how internal and external services interact with Dev and Ops, and practical guidance for implementing service‑driven DevOps in PSS contexts. This work offers a holistic framework to align service units with software development and customer operations, improving customer satisfaction and revenue in product‑oriented PSS settings.
Abstract
For companies developing web-based applications, the Dev and the Ops refer to different groups with either operational or development focus. Therefore, DevOps help these companies streamline software development and operations activities by emphasizing the collaboration between the two groups. However, for companies producing software-intensive products, the Ops would refer to customers who use and operate the product. In addition, companies producing software-intensive products do not only offer products to customers but rather Product Service Systems (PSS), where product-related services play a key role in ensuring customer satisfaction besides their significant revenue contribution. Thus, the context of product-oriented PSS is very different from web-based applications, making it difficult to apply DevOps without considering the role of the services. Therefore, based on a two years participant observation case study conducted at a multinational telecommunications systems provider, we propose a new and novel approach called Development-Services-Operations (DevServOps) which incorporates services as a key player facilitating an end-to-end software flow toward customers in one direction and feedback toward developers in the other direction. Services become the glue that connects the Dev and the Ops, achieved by providing internal services to increase the precision of the development organization and external services to increase the speed of deployment and new content adoption on the customers' side.