Empirical results from the transformation of a large commercial technical computing environment

Technical computing has unique requirements which are exemplified by factors such as: an extreme focus on run-time performance, a high degree of responsiveness to the customer base, a continued focus on innovation, concurrent support on multiple computing platforms and most importantly, a very limited set of deep subject matter experts who have the skills to build the solution. Exacerbating the above issues is the fact that the field has traditionally seen a great deal of mergers and acquisition activity which leads quickly to an accumulation of disjoint software development systems. This paper describes a detailed case study built within a leading technical computing company which achieved significant success by focusing relentlessly on enhancing the productivity of the individual developer. The work was driven by the author as the general manager of the organization, and measured results of the transformation will be presented in this paper.