The benefits and barriers that software development companies face when moving beyond agile development practices are identified in a multiple-case study in five Finnish companies. The practices that companies need to adopt when moving towards innovation experiment systems are recognised. The background of the study is the Stairway to Heaven (StH) model that describes the path that many software development companies take when advancing their development practices. The development practices in each case are investigated and analysed in relation to the StH model. At first the results of the analysis strengthened the validity of the StH model as a path taken by software development companies to advance their development practices. Based on the findings, the StH model was extended with a set of additional practices and their adoption levels for each step of the model. The extended model was validated in five case companies.