The World Teleport Association (WTA) has announced that Santander Teleport has achieved provisional certification of its Santander (Spain) Teleport under WTA’s Teleport Certification Program.
Santander Teleport.
Since its introduction at IBC 2015, the Certification program has quickly grown in popularity. Starting with one certified facility in 2015, the program has added 40 in three years and currently has 12 teleports engaged in the quality evaluation process.
Certifications have been issued to teleports operated by USEI, AXESAT, STN, Eutelsat, du, COMSAT, Signalhorn, Optus, Globecomm, Horizon, Media Broadcast, Elara Comunicaciones, GlobalSat, Talia, Telenor, Vivacom, Cyta, Batelco, SingTel, CETel, Etisalat, Hawaii Pacific Teleport, Intelsat, Speedcast, Telstra and Arqiva. The industry has quickly adopted the transparent, independently verified standards as a means for teleports to differentiate themselves and for customers to choose the price-performance level suitable for their applications.
To achieve Provisional Certification, a teleport operator completes a +170-item questionnaire and submits it to WTA. The Association analyzes the data based on standards established by its Certification Committee and issues the Provisional Certification based on the self-reported information. The teleport then has six months to achieve Full Certification. To achieve Full Certification under WTA’s program, an auditor is dispatched to visit the teleport, provide independent validation of the data submitted in the questionnaire, and identify additional factors that may positively or negatively affect the score. Full Certification is issued at a Tier number from 1 through 4, of which 4 represents the highest degree of excellence, and remains in effect for three years.
WTA’s Teleport Certification Program serves both teleport operators and their customers by creating an objective, transparent, and internationally accepted method for teleport operators to document the quality of their operations for customers and strategic partners. It also provides a means for customers to select teleport vendors delivering the price-performance level that is appropriate for their applications.
Luis Garcia, CEO of Santander Teleport, said the company is very pleased to become part of this certification program. Santander Teleport is committed to providing the highest level of service and support across the whole lifecycle of the relationship with customers and partners and firmly believe that, by continuously improving the firm's services, infrastructure and management processes, the mission to become the teleport partner of choice among international service providers and satellite operators will be achieved. The WTA certification program is helping us to understand better in which areas we thrive and in which areas we can focus on for further improvement, but it also provides teleport users valuable information and helps setting expectations about the different teleport choices available the marketplace.”
WTA Executive Director Robert Bell, added that quality of service is the key differentiator for teleport operators; however, prospective customers can only experience it after they become actual customers,. Teleport Certification provides independent, standards-based evaluation and validation of the factors that determine quality of service before they buy, and lets customers reliably select the price-performance balance they need.”