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Sanjeev Kumar VP, Engineering & Head, India Technology Center BEA Systems India August 2007

Great Leaders take Risk Building a World-Class Software Product Development Team in India. Sanjeev Kumar VP, Engineering & Head, India Technology Center BEA Systems India August 2007. BEA Systems Inc. – Introduction. The Middleware Company “BMW” of Infrastructure Software Industry

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Sanjeev Kumar VP, Engineering & Head, India Technology Center BEA Systems India August 2007

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  1. Great Leaders take RiskBuilding aWorld-Class Software Product Development Team in India Sanjeev Kumar VP, Engineering & Head, India Technology Center BEA Systems India August 2007

  2. BEA Systems Inc. – Introduction • The Middleware Company • “BMW” of Infrastructure Software Industry • “Software that customers use to build their software” • FedEx, DHL, WFB, PG&E, eTrade, Verizon, NYT, ideaCellular, Railways • Brands & Products • WebLogic: WL Platform, WLS, WLW, WLP, WLI, WLCP, WLEvS • AquaLogic: ALSB, ALBPM, ALUI, ALER, ALDSP, ALES, ALSR • Tuxedo: Core (/T, /Q, /WS, /Domain, /M, /HA), SALT, Jolt

  3. BEA – A History of Risk Taking • 1995: Tuxedo Purchase from Novell • Helped crystallize the middleware market-segment • 1998: WebLogic Inc. • Bet-the-company acquisition, created J2EE app server market • Best value-creation via acquisition (till VMWare acquisition) • 2001: CrossGain & Westside • Web Services, Controls & IDE; Did not meet expectations • 2006: WebLogic Integration (WLI) in India • All engineering functions to be done in Bangalore

  4. WLI Move to BEA, Bangalore • India R&D Center • About four years in operation • Initial teams focused on sustaining engineering • Currently 2:1 split in favor of mainline projects • WLI Functions at BLR Lab in 2006 • 40% of development projects • Most of QA, sustaining engineering and backline support • Risks • Ownership of overall design and code-base • No prior record in release and program management • High degree of interactions and dependencies (“chatty-ness”)

  5. Engineering Team Parameters • Balance in Product & Technical Expertise (“DNA”) • Mix of new hires from similar product or competing companies • Few senior engineers with a three-year history with the product • Skills coverage on all the building-block technologies used • Balance in Team • Small “pyramid” teams, anchored by experienced engineers • Technical Depth, Energy Levels, “Can-do” Attitude & Motivation • An environment for technical discourse and a “positive echo” • Coverage in all Functions • Development and QA are well understood • Release Management: inter-team interactions & dependencies • Program Management: bridge customer-view and product internals

  6. Placing Bets on People & Team • Individual Level Roles • Developers taking on new or unfamiliar sub-systems • An QA engineer learns to be a release manager (“herding cats!”) • An architect from an ERP product company steps up as program mgr • Performance as a Collective (Engineering Team) • Weekly local product team meeting covering all functions • Ability to break-down high-level requirements into manageable chunks • Estimation of schedule at task, intermediate milestone and release levels • “External” Interactions as Growth Opportunities • Critical customer situations: leads visiting serious deployments sites • Local beta customers: feedback loop on functional & operational aspects • Local training courses: leads conducting Q&A sessions with customers

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