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22.09.2014

Zero Time Difference for Global Cloud Certification III collaborates

First ECSA-ACH Facilitates Taiwanese Cloud Businesses Striding for Global Market

According to the report made by MIC, Institute for Information Industry, III, by 2016 the scale of cloud computing service industry will reach USD142.5 billion worldwide, thanks to the flourishing development in the global cloud market. The trend of cloud service provisioning and up taking from European, North American, and Asian markets arouses concerns with security and data privacy protection which are also critical issues need to be tackled together with the expectation from the user side for compliance to cloud service SLA.

The reason that III decides to introduce ECSA* is to help establish a sound and trustworthy environment for developing the cloud computing industry in Taiwan, and at the same time to benefit the cloud service users as a whole. III as an organization responsible for promoting cloud computing industry has formed its teams of technology R&D, testing lab, think tank and promotion office. Dr. Gary Gong, Vice President of III and Dr. Tobias Höllwarth, Vice President of EuroCloud Europe and Director of ECSA, signs the contract of ECSA-ACH on 22 September 2014 so as to become the first Chapter globally. This cooperation helps pave a road for Taiwanese cloud computing related businesses exploring European and global markets by obtaining ECSA certificates. On the same occasion Mr. David Huang,Vice President of SGS Asia Region, Systems & Services Certification, also signs the contract with ECE as the first accredited certification partner, ECSA-AAO, in Asia.

According to internal source one of concerns that President Ruey-BeeiWu of III mentioned, when he decided to approve the proposed role as ECSA-ACH, was that III also needs to consider get cloud related R&D deliverables such as CAFÉ and solutions, e.g. iServCloud for IaaS management, certified by international schemes. With certification backed up III could better team up with other Taiwanese cloud venders and service providers to offer to the global market quality assured total cloud services. Dr. Eva Yueh, Deputy Director General of IDEAS Institute of III and also in charge of introducing ECSA and promoting in Taiwan, emphasizes that service provisioning by varied role players in a global supply chain is one of special features of cloud service. Companies of this field in Taiwan are definitely in the global supply chain and their business affected by the rules and norms including 3rd party test and certification. Taiwanese companies cannot evade the fact by arguing that they only export cloud hardware or provide cloud applications and services to local users, therefore, a 3rd party certification assuring the level of security, data privacy compliance, SLA and service management is not on their priority agenda. Dr. Yueh suggests that a global view is desperately needed by companies and R&D organizations shooting for global markets, which requests international standard compliance in terms of product and service specification and service operation management. Obtaining a 3rd party certification such as ECSA is simply natural outcome for a company with service quality complying with international standard.   

Dr. Gong at the Signing Ceremony address indicates: “Objectively speaking, the personal and business related data processing in the cloud supply chain needs to comply with cross border data protection related regulations. ECSA scheme is exactly developed for a balance taking care of issues in respect of security, data privacy protection and compliance, SLA and operation service management. This globally recognized 3rd party certification scheme could better help establish a sound and trustworthy environment of the cloud service industry and assure to the users for security, service continuity and protected data privacy according to the quality level certified by ECSA. It may also be referred by the mechanism of public procurement for cloud product and service on the platform of Inter-Entity Supply Contract.

Quanta used to be recognized internationally as one of major manufacturers of electronic devices has gone through a process of transforming into a cloud service provider, who offers services of “Manufacture Cloud”to their global supply chain partners. Mr. T. J. Fang, Vice President of Cloud Computing Application Service Development Centre, CCASDC, and CIO of Quanta stated: “The Manufacture Cloud Platform provisioning management related services to our global supply chain partners needs to guarantee the service level. In addition to cloud security, 24x7 service continuity, data privacy protection and compliance are also critical issues we are facing and have been covered in the service management. The assurance for secure and high quality service would be even more convincing if it is certified by a 3rd party audit scheme such as ECSA, which can also push us for continuing improvement.”In addition, relying on the abundant experiences and resources accumulated in the Taiwan mobile, General Manager Mr. Cliff Lai of Taiwan Star Telecom Corp, T Star, recognizes the total value of ECSA from the cloud service and 4G operator’s perspectives. Especially, he is impressed by the fact that ECSA scheme also covers assessment items with respect to IT service management.

In addition to SGS there are many consulting and training organizations such as Deloitte, KPMG, III, TASC, and CSPs, e.g. Chunghwa Telecom participating in the ECSA training and accreditation program this time, and witness the signing ceremony today (22nd September 2014). It is expected to have totally 30 trainers and consultants accredited who will be the seeds continually expanding the ECSA professional workforce in Taiwan. SGS as the first ECSA-AAO has already completed a certification project with Taiwan Mobile on the Fixed Network Cloud, who will be awarded ECSA certificate on 25 September. With this successful case Taiwan’s cloud service industry is striding into a new age. Dr. Tobias Höllwarth gives the compliment for the whole arrangement: “I am very impressed about the speed, the fast uptake and the professionalism of Taiwanese organisations,and I especially thank SGSfororganizing this training program and Dr.EvaYueh of IIIfor a perfect start of our ecosystem in Asia.”  

III plans to promote ECSA in Chinese speaking region based on, first, the experiences accumulated in Taiwan. It strongly urges individual professionals, organizations and companies from certification, consultancy and training fields collaboratively work with III in order to develop the ecosystem in Taiwan. Companies from IT service, banking and financing, telecom, Internet and mobile service, who recognize ECSA values proposed by ECE, and want to know how to compare and select cloud services from different providers, and to do the self-assessment, are also encouraged to contact III. For more information of ECE, ECSA and III please refer to the website at www.staraudit.org/cn.  

* Since 2011, EuroCloud Europe, ECE, have developed ECSA scheme called EuroCloud Star Audit. ECE collaborated closely with experts and specialists from the government, certification partners such as SGS, role players from the ecosystem of cloud computing to develop a globally applicable certification scheme which not only covers cloud security and data privacy protection, but also emphasizes the importance of SLA and service operation management. The whole framework helps assure cloud service availability and user satisfaction.

Liaison Officer

IDEAS/III: Chih-Hao CHEN,Tel: +886-2-6607-2604, email: how@iii.org.tw

PED/III: Meredith Chang, Joy Yen, Freesia Shen, Tel: +882-6- 6631-8638, +886-2-6631-8640, +886-2-6631-8643

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