Avaya pledges to wipe out delivery and quality issues

Vendor to tighten up after revealing one fifth of kit was affected in FY11

Avaya has vowed to eradicate product quality and delivery issues, after revealing 20 per cent of kit was beset by such problems in FY11.

Alan Baratz, Avaya's president of global communications solutions, told attendees at the vendor's EMEA partner summit in Berlin, that the firm had brought 40 new products to market last year.

"Eighty per cent of those were sold on time and on spec," added the Avaya man. "But some were not on time and some had quality issues. When you're focused on delivering end-to-end solutions, you are only as good as the weakest link. We need to make sure this doesn't happen again."

Baratz claimed good progress is already being made on tightening up testing and delivery procedures. The goal in FY12 is to release products with only a one per cent defect rate during their first six months on the shelves, he explained.

To that end, the Implementation Quality Index has been brought in for products in development. Technologies can score quarter, half, or full points in areas such as automated regression testing, design review, code review and architecture review. Kit scoring higher than 2.5 points will be considered fit for release.

Avaya is also aiming to deliver 90 per cent of products on time in FY12. And, on the remaining 10 per cent, "there should be no slips greater than a quarter", revealed Baratz.