Contracting agile developments for mission critical systems in the public sector

Although Agile is a well established software development paradigm, major concerns arise when it comes to contracting issues between a software consumer and a software producer. How to contractualize the Agile production of software, especially for security & mission critical organizations, whic...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:2018 IEEE ACM 40th International Conference on Software Engineering Software Engineering in Society (ICSE SEIS) pp. 47 - 56
Main Authors: Russo, Daniel, Taccogna, Gerolamo, Ciancarini, Paolo, Messina, Angelo, Succi, Giancarlo
Format: Conference Proceeding
Language:English
Published: New York, NY, USA ACM 27.05.2018
Series:ACM Conferences
Subjects:
Agile
Agile Contracts
Applied computing > Enterprise computing > IT governance
Applied computing > Law, social and behavioral sciences > Economics
Applied computing > Law, social and behavioral sciences > Law
Biological system modeling
Contracting
Contracts
Economics
Law
Law & Economics
Mission critical systems
Public Sector
Social and professional topics > Computing > technology policy
Social and professional topics > Professional topics
Software
Software and its engineering > Software creation and management
Software and its engineering > Software organization and properties
Software engineering
agile contracts
public sector
software engineering
agile
law & economics
contracting
ISBN:9781450356619, 1450356613
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Although Agile is a well established software development paradigm, major concerns arise when it comes to contracting issues between a software consumer and a software producer. How to contractualize the Agile production of software, especially for security & mission critical organizations, which typically outsource software projects, has been a major concern since the beginning of the "Agile Era." In literature, little has been done, from a foundational point of view regarding the formalization of such contracts. Indeed, when the development is outsourced, the management of the contractual life is non-trivial. This happens because the interests of the two parties are typically not aligned. In these situations, software houses strive for the minimization of the effort, while the customer commonly expects high quality artifacts. This structural asymmetry can hardly be overcome with traditional "Waterfall" contracts. In this work, we propose a foundational approach to the Law & Economics of Agile contracts. Moreover, we explore the key elements of the Italian procurement law and outline a suitable solution to merge some basic legal constraints with Agile requirements. Finally, a case study is presented, describing how Agile contracting has been concretely implemented in the Italian Defense Acquisition Process. This work is intended to be a framework for Agile contracts for the Italian public sector of critical systems, according to the new contractual law (Codice degli Appalti).
ISBN:9781450356619
1450356613
DOI:10.1145/3183428.3183435