The pressures on software development organizations have never been higher. Changes in development methodologies, technology infrastructure, and business requirements continue to strain companies' build-test-deploy processes. Traditional, homegrown approaches are becoming obsolete, as they are too hard to manage, too slow, and too hard to understand.

The build-test-deploy process offers the greatest promise for improving the software development process today. For years, tools have addressed front-end software development problems through version control, editors, debuggers, etc. But development teams are now realizing the need to address "back end" software production processes to save time, improve product quality and deliver software to market faster.

"What are the combined results of inadequate build and release management for companies? Poor quality, low staff productivity, long release cycles, and non-compliance. Ultimately, however, less profitability for the business is the end result of ineffective build management." — Melinda-Carol Ballou, IDC, Effective build management for better software development, 2007

What is driving the need for investment in the software production process now?

		Agile development requires fast, automated builds
		Geographically distributed development requires secure, remote access to resources and real-time visibility into results
		Virtualized build and test automation requires integrated, flexible, and self-service tools and processes
		Quality software requires process automation and a self-service build and test infrastructure
		An effective build-test-deploy process across an enterprise requires centralization and control
		Compliance efforts require a transparent, repeatable software production process
		Build management at an enterprise level requires a scalable, tool-agnostic solution
		Build acceleration across platforms requires a foolproof understanding of dependencies