Twenty years of growth for certification

[Sidney Vianna]

http://www.dnv.com/news_events/news/...rsofgrowth.asp

DNV is celebrating the 20-year anniversary of accreditation to perform certification according to the ISO 9001 – Quality Management System standard.

DNV Certification B.V. in the Netherlands was accredited on 25 February 1989. Certification Ltd. in the UK was also accredited on 1 July that year.
The first company to be certified to the ISO 9001 standard was Grootint B.V. (now Heerema Zwijndrecht B.V.). “Grootint was audited by DNV Rotterdam already in 1982-1983 according to the Norwegian standard NS-5801, one of the earlier standards, so they were a natural first choice for us to approach with ISO 9001 certification,” says Senior Principal Surveyor Peter Mackenbach, DNV Rotterdam.
“It is a great achievement that we systematically over 20 years have built a world leading position,” says CEO Henrik O. Madsen. “We started based on competence we had in DNV Maritime and Offshore, including our own standard for certification of quality management systems.”

Core DNV competency
DNV is today among the three largest certification bodies in the world. Bjørn K. Haugland COO in DNV says, “What started as a local activity with only a few employees in the Netherlands and UK has become a very important business for DNV.”
“Management System Certification is one of the core businesses for DNV. We are providing trust and confidence to more than 50,000 customers worldwide and assure their sustainable business performance through our portfolio of services,” says Bjørn K. Haugland.
“Let us honour the pioneers from 1989 who had the focus on customers, innovation and creativity and started this great journey,” ends Bjørn K. Haugland.