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6 Critical Reasons Why You Can't Afford To Delay Automating Your Software Testing

There are and will always be software companies that are making so much money that cutting costs is a low priority. As we learn from experience, this runs in cycles. Competition always seems to catch up and force price reductions. The winning companies, those that will likely sustain long term growth, are squeezing the most out of every asset. Pressure is continually applied to do more with less.

Let’s assume that marketing and sales are doing an effective job identifying and formulating the needs of the marketplace for the development organization. It’s the development organization’s responsibility to deliver the best product possible while managing 3 key factors.

  • Cost
  • Development cycle time
  • Product quality

This discussion will focus on 6 important reasons for automating the testing of software and how each supports the three key factors above. This issue will address Reason Number 1.

Critical Reason Number 1: Reduce The Overall Cost Of Development.

How would you reduce the overall cost of development without 1) reducing the scope of the release, 2) reducing the frequency of releases, or 3) reducing the cost of the resources? I’m sure there are other ways to reduce the cost of development. We will focus on a proven way to reduce overall costs.

By automating the software testing process, you can effectively produce more with fewer resources. The overall development costs can be reduced without reducing product scope, frequency of the releases or anything else.

Implement a Proven Process To Reduce Software Development Costs and Speed Up The Release Cycle.

It’s using readily available technology and adding a proven methodology to develop automation that cuts time and cost from the development cycle while improving quality.

Automating the quality assurance process is not a new concept. In fact, software test automation tools have been around for decades. The problem is there is no handbook for producing automation that works. Many companies find it’s not that difficult to create automation, the hard part is developing automation that is easy and cost effective to maintain when the software functionality changes. If done incorrectly, the automation becomes so cumbersome, it becomes cost ineffective to maintain.

Finally, A Way To Do Software Development At Costs Lower Than Offshore.

To begin to understand the magnitude of this opportunity, think about the following questions.

  1. What if you could run a regression test on a new build overnight and provide the test results the next morning? Would it be easier and quicker for your developers to do the fixes?
  2. What if you could reduce the number of product errors to the field by 90%? Would you be able to reduce the time developers spend fixing bugs? Would customer satisfaction improve?

You begin to see how QA Automation, if done correctly, can reduce development costs by over 50%.

"Our investment made in automation and the ability to test applications overnight with virtually no manpower will translate into $1,000,000 savings in the next 12 months."
Martin Ferguson, Ardais' Senior Vice President of Bioinformatics.

Here are the some of the opportunities for savings.

  1. Reduce the need for manual testing
  2. Compress the release cycle time
  3. Reduce the number of defects released in the product
  4. Reduce the number of helpline and maintenance personnel
  5. Reduce the time developers spend fixing bugs introduced to the field
  6. Increase the productivity of the development group
  7. Reduce the number of fixes or interim releases required by to the field

In the next issue we will discuss Critical Reason Number 2.

By: Clayton Blaylock, Senior Vice President of qaSignature
Please e-mail your comments to cblaylock@qasignature.com or call me directly @ (617) 510-6545.

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