Software Engineering Institute

Media Contact:
SEI Media Relations
Kelly Kimberland, APR
Tel: 412-268-4793
E-mail: public-relations@sei.cmu.edu

Pittsburgh, PA, and Needham, MA, USA, August 19, 2009—The Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute (SEI) and the Object Management Group (OMG) today announced a partnership to sponsor the Consortium of IT Software Quality (CISQ), an industry-led initiative to address the measurement of critical IT application quality attributes.

“The SEI provides a neutral environment for IT executives to address quality challenges as an industry and develop the standards and infrastructure necessary to address them,” said Dr. Paul D. Nielsen, director and CEO of the SEI. “OMG’s success in standards development and the SEI’s experience in software architecture, quality attributes, process improvement, and network security make this a very strong partnership with global reach.”

“For several years IT executives have complained that there are no industry standards for measuring the quality of business application software,” said Dr. Richard Soley, CEO of OMG. “CISQ will enable us to benchmark the effectiveness of internal development, evaluate the quality of applications acquired from external sources, and predict the quality and cost of IT services to the business.”

CISQ will bring together industry executives from Global 2000 IT organizations, system integrators, outsourcers, and package vendors to jointly address the challenge of standardizing the measurement of IT software quality and to promote a market-based ecosystem to support its deployment. One of CISQ’s earliest objectives will be to develop an industry standard that provides the detail necessary to automate the measurement of quality attributes. 

“For application quality measurement to be economically practical it must be automated, and that requires a level of standardization that does not exist today,” said Soley.

CISQ’s five primary objectives are to:

1. advise, educate, and be the voice to business and government leaders on the strategic and mission critical importance of IT application quality
2. develop standard measures of quality attributes to be used by IT and the business for evaluating the software quality and risk of multi-tier IT applications
3. propose methods for using quality measures in negotiating and managing the acquisition or maintenance of IT application software
4. develop and promote professional licensing for those providing services to assess the quality of IT application software
5. establish an online IT industry forum for addressing IT application quality issues

CISQ’s director, Dr. Bill Curtis, co-author of the Capability Maturity Model (CMM) and a non-resident affiliate of the SEI, stated that he is excited to work with IT leaders and technical experts from business and government to tackle the growing complexity of multi-language, multi-tier business applications. “Unless we address the quality challenges of these systems, business and government operations will be placed at unacceptable risk,” said Curtis. 

Capers Jones, a well-recognized IT industry expert has joined this partnership as a CISQ distinguished advisor.  He will contribute his expertise in software quality and size measurement to the achievement of CISQ’s objectives.  The inaugural CISQ Executive Forums will be held at the SEI facilities on October 6 in Arlington, Va., and November 12 in Frankfurt, Germany. The aim is to have a draft of the IT quality standard by the fourth quarter of 2010. Licensing of IT quality service providers is expected to begin during 2011. 

About the Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute
The Software Engineering Institute (SEI) is a U.S. Department of Defense federally funded research and development center operated by Carnegie Mellon University. The SEI helps organizations make measured improvements in their software engineering capabilities by providing technical leadership to advance the practice of software engineering. For more information, visit the SEI website at http://www.sei.cmu.edu.

About OMG
OMG is an international, open membership, not-for-profit computer industry consortium that in 2009 is celebrating its 20th anniversary. OMG task forces develop enterprise integration standards for a wide range of technologies, including: real-time, embedded, and specialized systems; analysis & design; architecture-driven modernization, and middleware. OMG standards serve a wide range of industries, including: business modeling and integration, C4I, finance, government, green computing, health care, insurance, legal compliance, life sciences research, manufacturing technology, robotics, software-based communications, and space. For more information, visit the OMG website at http://www.omg.org.