SYSGO´s development and support processes are certified according to SPICE Level 3

Successful Long-term Commitment to Highest Quality

Mainz/Germany, January 09, 2007

SYSGO, the European vendor of reliable device software, has been certified according to the ISO/IEC 15504 (SPICE) model by the Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE). The majority of the reviewed processes achieved SPICE Level 3. This corresponds to the same level under the CMMI model of Carnegie Mellon University´s Software Engineering Institute. SYSGO is the only RTOS vendor, worldwide, that has achieved these process quality levels.

"In the past, our customers themselves always audited and approved SYSGO´s development and support processes. The SPICE assessment results provide proof from an independent, authoritative standards organization, that SYSGO has a commitment to the highest development quality for its customers. SYSGO´s product development processes and its customer relationships, as well as its support processes, have now been reviewed; almost every process reached Level 3," said Bettina Uebe, SYSGO´s Quality Assurance Manager.

"SYSGO´s QA Management is working extremely effective," said Ralf Kalmar, the SPICE Assessor at Fraunhofer IESE. "Our assessment was based on SYSGO´s AFDX (Avionics Full Duplex Switched Ethernet) product, which is exemplary for software development at SYSGO."

The SPICE Assessment Model, also known as ISO/IEC 15504-5, defines five levels of quality maturity:

1. Performed
2. Managed
3. Established
4. Predictable
5. Optimizing

This classification is similar to the quality maturity stages of SEI´s Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI). The assessment procedure for SPICE and CMMI involves the selection of specific company processes. Not all processes are assessed; instead, each company selects the processes that are important for its customers. For example, a process that monitors suppliers is not relevant when a product doesn´t include components supplied by others.

For its IESE assessment, SYSGO chose processes that are involved with engineering, customer support, management and process improvement. The selection was based on the interests of SYSGO customers, as well as SYSGO´s intention to undergo a SPICE4SPACE assessment as soon as this special SPICE implementation is established.