Quality

IPL is differentiated by its outstanding engineering quality and quality management. Our determination to maintain the highest quality standards stems from our Board of Directors and we make quality the paramount responsibility of each individual within the Company. IPL has always had this dominant quality culture, and our Quality Management System (QMS) has been refined over more than 20 years, receiving many exacting and prestigious certifications. IPL is therefore often consulted by organizations wishing to achieve high quality standards, or wishing to assess their suppliers' quality processes.

Quality Management System

IPL's QMS is a framework of people, procedures and tools. IPL's staff are very carefully selected from the cream of the UK's engineering graduates, and are continually trained and retrained in relevant engineering skills and quality processes.

The largest procedural part of the IPL QMS is the Software Code of Practice (SCOP), which is used by default on all IPL projects. SCOP ensures that quality is engineered at all stages of the software life cycle. Comprehensive software documentation is produced and maintained at each level of the methodologies which the SCOP supports.

IPL's Quality Assurance (QA) team reports to the Board independently of the executive engineering management, and continuously monitors all IPL activities to verify and audit compliance with the QMS procedures.

We also have a range of specialist tools to support our QMS, including our own world class testing tools, which we now market across the software industry.

QMS Standards

IPL's QMS has been certified:

• by the British Standards Institution (BSI) in 1988 to ISO 9001, making IPL the 12th UK company to achieve this status.
• by the BSI under the BS EN ISO 9001/TickIT scheme produced jointly with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI). This scheme requires our QMS to be audited every six months and re-assessed every three years.

It has also been recognized by the Federal Aviation Authority as complying with the requirements for Level 1 (Flight Critical) software as defined by the United States Radio Technical Commission for Aeronautics (RTCA-DO-178B).