Technology

Delivery Excellence:

Level 3 Certification for Zone 24x7

Gamini WARUSHAMANA

Zone24x7, a US based technology solutions company recently obtained the CMMI Level 3 certification by the US based Software Engineering Institute, part of Carnegie Mellon University, USA. CMMI or Capability Maturity Model Integration is a process framework that helps improve quality with continuous improvement practices for successful project execution and delivery. Adoption of CMMI framework demonstrates Zone24x7’s continuing efforts to maintain the utmost quality standards and successfully delivering measurable business benefits to all their clients.

The journey has been a manifestation of corporate vision and the CMMI Level 3 certification marks an important milestone in the journey towards excellence.

Common goal

“The company is focusing on a common goal. Scalability, quality and consistency are the most important attributes in it. Company’s attention on this is clearly demonstrated by achieving CMMI Certification”, said Llavan Fernando, President/CEO of Zone24x7.

This great achievement demonstrates yet another sign of the company’s commitment towards adopting world class business practices. This bears witness to continual development of its services and products for client success.

“Using the CMMI model Zone24x7 has been able to successfully define lightweight processes in ‘Zone Way’, the project execution framework of the company.

As a company that started with fully agile processes, we have been able to arrive at a happy balance today which would definitely help our projects.

Endorsement of CMMI level 3 certification on ‘Zone Way’ which includes project execution, knowledge management and performance evaluation is indeed an encouragement to continue to march our way towards building Technoprenuers at Zone24x7”, said Manjula Dissanayake, Vice President of Global Operations at Zone24x7. “We are proud to be among the first few companies in Sri Lanka to obtain this prestigious certification for the high quality services and products of the company” he added.

CMMI is a set of best practices developed in the USA by the Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute (SEI) in collaboration with industry and government. SEI is an internationally recognised standard for assessing software development practices. According to SEI, CMMI is being adopted by companies worldwide to improve their performance in software development. In this respect, CMMI addresses not only the activities linked to software engineering, but also the disciplines of project management and process support and management, aiming to enhance the maturity of the organisation and the project execution capacity of the people that work there.

Experts from KPMG, a global leader in independent testing and evaluation services conducted the assessments at Zone24x7.

Leading provider

Zone24x7 is a leading provider of global technology innovation services with world-class partnerships. Since its inception in 2003, Zone24x7 benchmarks the finest technological capabilities and delivering innovation with profound industry and business process expertise. Headquartered in San Jose, USA, Zone24x7 operates in the USA, Sri Lanka and Malaysia providing technology solutions to leading clients around the world.

The company is recognized as a Microsoft Certified Gold Partner in Mobility Solutions, Custom Development Solutions and Data Management Solutions and also a Microsoft Gold Partner in Embedded Solutions. Zone24x7 prides itself in having the vision, leadership and a world-class team to drive creativity and innovation.

New Package for Blackberry from Dialog
 

Nushad Perera

Dialog Telekom PLC, and Research In Motion (RIM) (Nasdaq: RIMM; TSX: RIM) launched a new Lite service package designed to attract a wider range of customers to the BlackBerry(r) platform together with a promotional offer of 10% discount on all BlackBerry(r) devices, allowing more users to enjoy its productivity advantage and other benefits.

“The new Lite service package offers unlimited email at just Rs. 500 per month.

It is a result of our continuous efforts to innovate and yet offer cost-effective solutions for customers,” said Nushad Perera, Group Chief Marketing Officer of Dialog Telekom. “This new package will be attractive to a wide range of customers who rely on emails as a vital communication tool to stay in touch with friends, family and business associates. Dialog is now extending the BlackBerry service to small businesses, and even entrepreneurs affording the full benefits of mobility and seamless connectivity to a much broader market segment,” Perera added.

Today, BlackBerry smartphones from Dialog provide immense opportunity for large organisations, professionals and SME customers in Sri Lanka who want to be more accessible to their customers, co-workers and business contacts.

The freedom and flexibility of working while on the go is a must-have for business people and professionals who want to be efficient and effective in an ever competitive world.

“We are very pleased to be working with Dialog Telekom to introduce this important new service package for Dialog’s customers,” said Frenny Bawa, Vice President, India at Research In Motion.

“BlackBerry smartphones are popular all over the world for their ability to help people stay connected and be productive while on the move, and this new service plan will allow Dialog to offer those benefits to a broader market in Sri Lanka,” she added.

The Lite service plan works in conjunction with BlackBerry(r) Service and would offer unlimited access to up to 10 email accounts (POP3/IMAP supported including popular email services such as Yahoo! Mail and Google).

Coupled with Dialog’s island-wide coverage and international roaming agreements, BlackBerry smartphone users can access and respond to their emails at a time and place of their convenience. In keeping with the needs of the discerning BlackBerry service clientele in Sri Lanka, Dialog provides a 24x7 helpdesk, a team of certified engineers and a dedicated after-sales support team including technical support representatives at select customer outlets.

Dialog BlackBerry offers the widest range of BlackBerry smartphones in Sri Lanka /-, including the BlackBerry(r) Bold(tm), BlackBerry(r) Curve(tm) 8310, BlackBerry(r) Curve(tm) 8320, BlackBerry(r) Pearl(tm) 8120, BlackBerry(r) 8700v and BlackBerry(r) 8707v. The BlackBerry Bold smartphone is the latest offering and is supported on Dialog Telekom’s state-of-the-art HSPA network.

Great Lake, only Cisco online training centre

Founded in 2004, the Great Lake will celebrate 5 years of commitment to technology innovation, industry, leadership and corporative social responsibility.

It is the only fastest going Cisco Training Centre in Sri Lanka at present, the only Cisco Training Centre which does online training. Great Lake is well placed in the global online market and maintains good relationship with all students offering facilities that no other Cisco training centre offers to their student in Sri Lanka. The courses that Great Lake offer at CCNA (Cisco Certified Network associate) and CCNP (Cisco Certified Network Professional). As a company, The Great Lake operates on core values of customer focus so if the student needs basic network knowledge we offer it free with the CCNA course.

The series that Great Lake offer to the students The services that we offer include excellent customer service, unlimited lab practical hours, remote access, free refreshing classes (for those who miss lessons in the regular class) and free basic networking classes (those who are new to the industry).

Our corporate customers: Suntel Ltd., Mobitel (Pvt) Ltd., Sri Lanka Army, Sri Lanka Navy, Blue Chip Ltd.

CCNA

The Cisco Certified Network Associate or the CCNA is a certification for professionals who are genuinely interested in networking and who want to endeavour in the fields of Cisco routers and switches. And if the candidate doesn’t have any networking knowledge Great Lake will offer the basic knowledge about networking free of charge. The candidate need not have any IT educational knowledge to do CCNA. Cisco is a leading manufacture of networking equipment, including routers, bridges, frame switches and ATM switches, dial-up access servers and network management software. Cisco was found in 1984 by Leonard Bosack and Sandra Lerner, initially targeting universities, Cisco sold its first router in 1986.

Cisco is the leading router vendor and its operating system and routing protocols have become de facto standards.

Salary schemes

CCNA professionals not only earn more than others, but they are preferred for their level of competency. The professionals are paid the best salaries in the business and are assets to any company. The average salary of a CCNA professional is approximately $ 43,376.67. Research shows that certification can lead to a 12 percent increase in salary or close to a $ 6,000 raise. CCNA certified professionals were reported to have an average income of $ 70,000 in 2000. Multiple certifications directly correlate to pay increases. Reports reveal that if the GPA or Grade Point Average is excellent, the professional is paid an even higher salary. The GPA and the performance level of the professional determine the salary.The salaries of CCNA professionals differ within the region of operation. Data analysis shows that in the US, salaries differ according to the palace of work.

The benefits of CCNA certification are far greater than the fees paid for it. These professionals can work as network administrators.

They do well in Local Area Networks, LAN, Wide Area Networks, WAN, and other fields of computing. The salary of a CCNA professional largely depends on the organisation.

The metropolitan cities offer The CCNA professionals have very good career prospects. Statistics show that CCNA professionals get highly rewarding opportunities in the field of computing.