Introduction: The development of complex products requires specialized departments to handle the demands and to be competitive in the market. To handle the knowledge integration between the specialized departments, the boundaries need to be identified. Compared to previous research, this case study takes focus on the phases of one specific product development process in a software development organization. Therefore:

The purpose of this paper is to explore why boundaries exist in a software service development organization during a product development process and why they appear.

To fulfill the purpose of the study, the first research question focuses on where and when the boundaries appear in the organization’s product development process. Moreover, if these boundaries appear vertically or horizontally in the organization’s hierarchy structure. The second research question then needs to elaborate on why these appear. Therefore, the research questions for the study are:

RQ1: Where are the vertical and horizontal boundaries appearing in a software development organization during product development?

RQ2: Why did the identified boundaries appear in the organization?

Method: To answer the research questions, a single case study with an inductive approach. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect primary qualitative data from individuals involved in the product development process. A 10-step structured literature review was used to collect secondary data. The interviews were analyzed by a thematic analysis and later combined with the secondary data through theoretical analysis. The theoretical analysis was the basis to fulfill the research questions and the purpose.

Findings: The conclusion of the study shows that each of the phases in the product development process had boundaries that affect knowledge integration. Boundaries could be syntactic, semantic, or pragmatic, thus creating different kinds of consequences for the organization. Furthermore, the boundaries were either domain- specific, task-oriented, spatial, or temporal and could be vertical in the different levels of hierarchy, horizontal between departments and teams, or both. The reason behind the appearance of these boundaries was traced to multiple different possible explanations, like lack of artifacts, lack of trust, extensive use of tacit knowledge, and lack of integration.

Implications: The study has a theoretical implication by giving a practical approach to how to identify boundaries during a product development process in a software service organization. Furthermore, by identifying these boundaries and why they appear, the study has a practical implication for the case organization by contributing with understanding for their product development and future work with boundary crossing in their processes.

Limitations: The study is limited by being a single case study, thus having somewhat low generalizability for other organizations. Hence, it is recommended that future research repeats a similar study in other contexts.