Developing for Success in Consumer Electronics

Transcription

1 Developing for Success in Consumer Electronics Exclusive License to Distribute: Jama Software By André Girard, Senior Analyst, with Chris Rommel, Executive Vice President

2 Introduction In consumer electronics, the demand for connectivity and innovative new technology is advancing rapidly. Customer expectations for security are rising. Yet manufacturers are falling behind development outcomes are poor and challenges continue to mount. Processes must change to improve the quality and speed of product design. However, tight development budgets and the inertia of old practices is hindering adoption of the necessary fixes. No single adjustment will correct all of the product development issues for consumer electronics engineering teams, but steps on the path forward are clear. Outdated and inefficient processes that were good enough in the past no longer suffice. Without significant change, the industry risks falling further behind. Time-to-market windows are shrinking, profit margins remain tight, and technology requirements are rapidly growing more complex. To improve performance today and prepare for the challenges of tomorrow, engineering teams in consumer electronics must apply more rigor and discipline to their software and system development practices and their tooling decisions. Background on VDC VDC has been covering the embedded systems market since 1996 and the use of lifecycle management solutions since Data supporting discussions in this paper is based on findings from VDC s most recent Software and System Development Survey. This survey, capturing the input from 619 engineers, offers insight into leading business and technical trends impacting engineering organizations as well as the best practices implemented to address them. The respondents are directly involved in software and systems development across a range of industries including automotive, aerospace and defense, telecom, medical, industrial automation, and consumer electronics, among others. 2

3 Poor Practices Beget Poor Results Schedule performance highlights the lack of collaboration and rigor Consumer electronics engineers report the worst project schedule performance of any industry. In VDC s Software and System Development Survey, 55.9% of the respondents from consumer electronics indicate their current projects are running late. This significantly trails already poor results seen across the rest of the embedded industries, where 39.4% of current projects are behind schedule. The relatively tight time-to-market demands that are common in consumer electronics certainly add to this challenge. Short project lengths, however, are not solely to blame. Other industries such as digital signage, mobile phones, and telecommunications have shorter average project lengths yet still maintain superior average-schedule performance. Exhibit 1: Consumer Electronics Project Schedule Adherence 3.4% 11.9% Ahead of Schedule On Schedule Behind Schedule 28.8% Don t Know 55.9% In comparison to these and other embedded industries, engineering teams in consumer electronics collaborate less and apply a lower level of rigor to processes across the development lifecycle. By several measures, many organizations in the industry fail to take the necessary steps to put them in the best position for success. For example, the use of commercial development tools and structured development practices, especially the newer and more collaborative approaches, is low. In fact, 26.3% of development projects in consumer electronics do not follow any formal design methodology a rate far exceeding the average of 15.3% in similar projects across the remaining embedded industries. 3

4 Without changes, expect challenges to mount Exhibit 2: Top Delay Factors in Consumer Electronics Lack of Manpower Changes in Requirements Technical Obstacles Emergence of Higher Priority Projects Unrealistic Schedules Consumer electronics OEMs often face extremely tight profit margins on their products under development. This reality influences a range of decisions, from hiring, scheduling, and strategic investment. Staffing is typically lean across the industry. Respondents to VDC s Software and System Development Survey report an average of 15.5 engineers per project, compared to an average of 24.4 engineers in other industries. Lack of manpower is consequently the most frequently cited delay factor for consumer electronics projects. Time is also a limited resource. Tight margins and customer expectations for a rapid pace of technological advancement encourage OEMs to be aggressive getting products to market. In fact, the average development project length in consumer electronics is 15.0 months, as opposed to an average of 17.0 months across other industries. Time-to-market pressure encourages many companies to abbreviate valuable project preplanning. Unfortunately, this often results in further delays as necessary changes in requirements are not discovered early in the development lifecycle when the effort and cost of mitigation is lowest. 4

5 Exhibit 3: Consumer Electronics Development Cost (Average Distribution of Development Costs on Project) 22.8% 2.2% 50.6% Software + Web / IoT Electrical / Silicon Mechanical / Hardware Other 24.4% Software, both on-device and that used to power web/iot applications, continues to provide larger portions of the functionality for consumer electronic devices. It also accounts for an ever-growing proportion of development costs. Market demand for the rapid advance of device innovation and interest in IoT-related services is extremely high. These customer expectations encourage manufacturers to continue searching for ways to accelerate product development. Software remains the system component with the most malleable production. It is often the fastest way to introduce new features and typically the only way to deliver updates or services once a product has been deployed. As daunting as all the challenges currently facing consumer electronics development teams are, the real concern is for what comes next. The constraints of the industry lean staffing, tight budgets, aggressive schedules will not change. Meanwhile, the technical challenges connectivity, security, system integration, software content and complexity will continue to mount. Engineering teams need to find new ways to increase output and efficiency of software development, while continuing to improve quality. 5

6 Existing Strategies Will Not Scale Accelerating production requires new choices Historically, pressure to formalize software development practices in consumer electronics was rather low. Devices often had relatively modest code bases with limited need for connectivity and few safety or security impacts from software failure. Much of the production shifted to countries such as China, Mexico, and South Korea as manufacturers chased low labor costs. In these locations, hiring additional employees was often a viable option for speeding development, rather than providing advanced training or tooling to existing teams. But these are short-term fixes and no longer scale when wages start to rise. To deliver the advanced functionality that is in demand today, consumer electronics devices increasingly rely on software-driven functionality and the tight integration of software with electrical and mechanical system components. The resulting software growth and increase in complexity now outstrips the ability for manufacturers to hire their way out of development delays, especially as the price of quality software engineering talent escalates. Consumer electronics engineering teams must find ways to increase the accuracy, efficiency, and output of their existing development teams to avoid falling further behind. Implementing traceability across the development lifecycle is an important step OEMs can utilize to improve project outcomes. In software development, traceability connects necessary product features to requirements and connects these requirements to test cases. Applying traceability enables OEMs to validate that device specifications address specific customer needs and verify the code operates to correctly meet these requirements. While traceability is often used in the context of software design, its potential benefits extend across the full device development lifecycle. Traceability can help OEMs identify conflicting hardware, software, or electrical specifications early in product development and guide decisions about the necessary changes. Exhibit 4: Comparison of Tool Use Rates Consumer Electronics Other Industries Static Analysis 24.6% 31.8% Unit Testing 22.8% 34.2% Requirements Mgt 17.5% 22.3% Std-Language Modeling 12.3% 28.3% Dynamic Testing 10.5% 17.1% Model Based Testing 10.5% 16.6% Prop-Language Modeling 8.8% 15.4% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 6

7 Unfortunately tool use is another area suffering from the inertia of old practices. Results from VDC s Software and System Development Survey show the current-use rates of commercial development tools in consumer electronics lag far behind the overall embedded market. Increasing the use of commercial development tools should be a central part of process improvement initiatives by engineering organizations. Implementing an effective tooling strategy can help improve the speed and quality of software and system development outcomes in numerous ways. For example, teams can use requirement management (RM) tools to facilitate collaboration, enable traceability, and manage decision tracking. Automated test tools, such as static analysis and unit testing, can be applied to help find vulnerabilities early in the development lifecycle, when remediation costs are lower. Test tools can also be used to manage third-party code acceptance and integration. Managing traceability with in-house solutions is unsustainable Failures of consumer electronics devices infrequently have safety-critical ramifications. Nevertheless, establishing traceability is still a valuable best practice for security. Using traceability data, teams fixing software bugs can quickly find information on the decisions that introduced vulnerabilities and determine where else to find these issues. Unfortunately, a consequence of the low RM tool use-rate by consumer electronics teams is that many organizations cannot effectively manage traceability across their development lifecycle. Teams not using a commercial RM tool often try to manage the traceability of software or system dependencies with office productivity software (e.g., Microsoft Word or Excel) or solutions developed in-house. However, these practices are growing increasingly untenable. Challenges to this approach include expanding variant management needs, system dependencies that frequently bridge multiple engineering domains, and the number of applications facing compliance verification. Exhibit 5: Lifecycle Traceability of Requirements Engineering Formal (bi-directional traceability throughout the lifecycle and to most artifacts) Semi-Formal (traceability through some of the lifecycle and with some artifacts) Completely Informal (no links to any other artifacts) Don't Know or N/A 26.3% 5.3% 15.8% 19.6% 3.3% 30.5% Consumer Electronics Other Industries 52.6% 46.5% 7

8 VDC Software and System Development Survey results confirm that teams in consumer electronics were the least likely to apply formal requirements-engineering practices. In a formal approach, bi-directional traceability extends throughout the lifecycle and to most artifacts. Failing to correctly apply traceability increases the likelihood that conflicting interdependencies are only uncovered late in the development process when fixes are more costly and time consuming. Indeed, trying to manage traceability outside of a commercial RM tool has a clearly detrimental impact on project performance. Whereas 55.9% of consumer electronics projects are behind schedule, only 22.2% of projects applying formal requirements-engineering processes are running late. Belatedly, development practices are starting to evolve Adoption of collaborative development practices is rising across the embedded industries. More organizations are using Agile software development methodologies and improving the integration of teams from different engineering domains. Organizations using these practices can generate code and integrate system components more effectively by increasing the level of communication, planning, and data sharing among and between engineering teams. Yet, despite clear gains reported by teams applying Agile concepts or starting a cross engineering-domain integration, consumer electronics teams have been slow to embrace either practice. VDC survey respondents from consumer electronics had the lowest adoption rate of either practice among all embedded industries. This is changing adoption is rising. Many respondents not currently using any Agile methods expect to do so on similar projects in 3 years. Critically, as embedded development teams start to use these collaborative practices, they are typically adding aspects of the new methodologies into their existing processes. Rather than replace one framework with another, elements from several methodologies are combined to create a hybrid, or multi-modal development process. For example, projects may include extensive preplanning and requirements documentation, combined with stand-up meetings, sprints, and retrospectives. Organizations progressing through these changes must gather the right tooling resources. This should include an RM solution that enables the needed intra-team collaboration and traceability through the development lifecycle. The evolution of manufacturing practices in consumer electronics extends beyond software. As code creation demands continue to rise, more teams are starting software design earlier so the development of hardware, electrical, and software components can run concurrently. While this can greatly improve the pace of system development, it necessitates a higher level of coordination and inter-team collaboration. The requirements, plans, and progress of multiple teams need to be readily available and easily digestible to many stakeholders. Recommendations Increase the formality and efficiency of the development lifecycle Unfortunately for consumer electronics manufacturers, the market conditions and technology trends that make product development so challenging continue to escalate. Consumer demand for rapidly advancing functionality and innovative new applications fuels ongoing growth in software-driven functionality and increasing system complexity. Meanwhile, market expectations of affordability necessitate the continuance of tight time-to-market windows and lean staffing practices. These challenges often appear immutable, but there are several strategic choices that increase the likelihood of successful consumer electronics development projects. 8

9 1. Use a modern requirements management tool Consumer electronics organizations must improve collaboration and speed iteration through their design processes. A modern RM tool can help facilitate the sharing and linking of development artifacts needed for new methodologies while still providing the traceability and test management needed for embedded markets. Rather than just providing a system of record, a modern RM tool should be system of engagement. To ensure teams can use an RM tool for engagement, it needs a high level of usability. Stakeholders must be able to easily find the information they need and provide feedback. The RM solution must also meet the technical needs of embedded system development. RM tools support multiple teams that often have specialized tooling to support their areas of expertise. A modern RM solution must have robust and easy-to-manage integration with a wide range of commercial development tools to facilitate collaboration between these teams. As organizations extend collaboration and apply process improvements, they often combine elements from several methodologies. The right RM tool for this environment must provide the flexibility to support multi-modal system development. 2. Establish a comprehensive testing plan Automated testing is an essential element of newer development methodologies such as Agile and cross-domain integration that are increasingly used in consumer electronics development projects. A comprehensive testing plan should link to the requirements and features tracked in the organization s RM tool to ensure QA teams can verify that the system under development operates the way it was designed to function. Including different test-tool types helps ensure multiple types of bugs and vulnerabilities are addressed. Testing should begin at the earliest stages of design to find issues when they are easiest and least costly to address. The tests should continue to run frequently through the full development lifecycle to lessen late-stage integration and QA challenges. 3. Improve the management of software supply chains Across the embedded industries, software content needs are increasing faster than development teams can manage through internal coding alone. Teams designing products in consumer electronics have limited resources and already struggle to meet deadlines. Planning for new ways to increase code generation capabilities needs to start now. OEMs must now look beyond their in-house coding resources to keep pace with the rising software content creation demands in their products. Incorporating more code from multiple sources, both internal and external, can accelerate and improve the efficiency of development teams. Increasing the use of code generated by modeling tools, reused from other projects, and acquired from third-party sources can help organizations meet their rapidly expanding software requirements. But it must be carefully managed to avoid accidentally introducing liability, security, or vulnerability issues. Development processes should prepare for the use of multiple code sources by ensuring the risk assessments are conducted and the necessary development tools are in place. Automated test and software composition analysis tools should be used in the code acceptance and integration processes. RM tools can be used to help track code origins and provide traceability audits to meet any compliance mandates. Engineering teams developing products in the consumer electronics industry face a number of difficulties, and tight budgets can magnify the impact of failing to make the right decisions. The continued escalation of the technical challenges raises the criticality for firms to respond. Fortunately, a number of factors contributing to poor development project outcomes in the industry stem from outdated practices, not solely market conditions. Our findings show that implementing new processes and making different decisions can improve outcomes. 9

10 About the Authors André Girard André Girard brings valuable perspective to the market research and consulting of the IoT & Embedded Technology team, having previously covered connected devices for both the Telecom and Embedded Hardware practices at VDC. His primary areas of expertise include lifecycle management solutions, Agile development, and cross-domain engineering integration. André s IoT technology background includes opportunity sizing Contact André: agirard@vdcresearch.com and forecasting, market and technology assessments, competitive analysis, strategic marketing assistance, and M&A due diligence support. He also gained important experience as an independent consultant covering telecommunications and the smart grid. André holds a B.A. (magna cum laude) from MCLA. Chris Rommel Chris Rommel is responsible for syndicated research and consulting engagements focused on development and deployment solutions for intelligent systems. He has helped a wide variety of clients respond to and capitalize on the leading trends impacting next-generation device markets, such as security, the Internet of Things, and M2M connectivity, as well as the growing need for system-level lifecycle management solutions. Chris has also led a range of proprietary consulting projects, including competitive analyses, strategic marketing initiative support, ecosystem development strategies, and vertical market opportunity assessments. Chris holds a B.A. in Business Economics and a B.A. in Public and Private Sector Organization from Brown University. About vdc research Founded in 1971, VDC Research provides in-depth insights to technology vendors, end users, and investors across the globe. As a market research and consulting firm, VDC s coverage of AutoID, enterprise mobility, industrial automation, and IoT and embedded technologies is among the most advanced in the industry, helping our clients make critical decisions with confidence. Offering syndicated reports and custom consultation, our methodologies consistently provide accurate forecasts and unmatched thought leadership for deeply technical markets. Located in Natick, Massachusetts, VDC prides itself on its close personal relationships with clients, delivering an attention to detail and a unique perspective that is second to none VDC Research Group, Inc. P info@vdcresearch.com 10