Vendor titans lay down arms for new association

Ten global vendors join forces to protect customer standards in IT infrastructure

Ten vendor giants have joined forces to form an industry standard aimed at maintaining quality and reliability in IT infrastructure.

Brocade, Cisco, Dell EMC, Hitachi Data Systems, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Juniper Networks, SAP, SUSE and T-Systems have launched the Zero Outage Industry Standard Association, which aims to set benchmarks for error response times, employee qualification levels, security requirements and platform requirements.

In a joint press release, the vendors said: "The digital world is increasingly dependent on IT. A technical defect, human error or untrained process execution can be a threat to everyday operations.

"Therefore manufacturers and service companies are growing a sense of urgency for an uninterruptible supply of their services.

"With the Zero Outage Industry Standard Association, major tech companies want to start an industry-wide discussion and work out a common understanding of quality."

The vendors are set to collaborate in building a framework of best practice standards, which will be published on the Zero Outage website.

"The aim of the Zero Outage Association addresses a critical challenge for our customers as they digitise their businesses," said Cisco senior vice president Cedrik Neike.

"As a founding member, we can share our expertise to help this initiative achieve its goals for the greater benefit of our customers."