“The process of onboarding any new partner goes through a multi-step process, one of them is the due diligence of the credentials,” said Abhishek Gupta, CIO at leading Indian satellite broadcaster DishTV. “With this episode, organizations will have to go deeper to verify the reported credentials, including certifications, of a new vendor on the block.”
CIOs often rely on multiple sources when evaluating new data center partners. Client references, physical site visits, and informal validation through the CIO community are part of the process.
“Even today, IT leaders try to evaluate the actual performance of a new prospect before onboarding as a data center partner,” Gupta added. “While certifications are important for evaluating the level of fault tolerance, additional measures, such as verifying the certifying authority’s legitimacy, are likely to gain more importance.”
The certification authenticity forms a smaller part of overall final decision-making, said Gupta. According to him, this episode shouldn’t change the evaluation methodology.
“Just that when things are not adding up, a healthy skepticism might arise about the veracity of certification claimed by a new vendor,” added Gupta. “In all such cases, CIOs will most likely show risk aversion and may choose not to go with a new DC partner on the block.”
Gupta further added that the certification level of DC helps CIOs to evaluate the level of fault tolerance. “So it certainly matters in areas where security of data is of paramount importance.”
