Cornelius Weitzmann, CEO Mobility at Voith Turbo: Quality is of crucial importance
IRQB is happy to bring you testimonials from our member companies across the world and the rail sector. These short interviews will give insight to the benefits of IRQB’s work from the perspective of rail sector companies.
Questions answered by: Cornelius Weitzmann, CEO Mobility at Voith Turbo
Why did your company decide to join IRQB?
Voith Turbo has been a member of the IRIS group since 2005 before the first revision of IRIS was issued and is still very active in supporting, improving and promoting ISO/TS 22163 standard and IRIS Certification to improve quality in the rail sector. Quality for Voith is the pursuit to create the right solution for our customers. So for Voith it is corollary to continue our advocacy for quality on an international level as a founding member of the IRQB.
In your opinion, what is the growing importance of IRQB?
One reason to found the IRQB was to shift the former IRIS standard and its governance from a private sector standard to an international ISO standard, which is recognized and applied worldwide. Nowadays our customers and supply chains are international and acting globally as well as our products that are in service world wide. So the IRQB as an international group of key players in the rail sector will become more and more important.
Our mission to create the right solution is our path to quality – as an ambition to ourselves, to our team, our managers and co-workers at Voith.
What is the importance of quality from a manufacturer’s perspective?
Quality is crucial. Quality for Voith is the pursuit to create the right solution for our customers. Our mission to create the right solution is our path to quality – as an ambition to ourselves, to our team, our managers and co-workers at Voith. Only in this way can we meet the expectations and requirements of our customers, create trust among our business partners and ensure our long-term success.
How is IRIS Certification beneficial for your company?
Since the first IRIS standard published in 2006, it included the IRIS assessment methodology and the IRIS certification rules. These requirements enable a lot of advantages for the rail sector and for Voith. For example, a strong maturity level assessment concerning the fulfilment of rail specific requirements by IRIS certified companies, performed by IRIS approved Certification bodies, which gives us trust in IRIS certification. In addition, a lot of 2nd and 3rd party audits are reduced because ISO/TS 22163 requirements already fulfil partially or completely the requirements of many other rail schemes, or customers agree on cross acceptance of IRIS Certification.
In your opinion, what is the importance of IRIS Certification for the rail sector?
On one hand, IRIS certification is based on the international standard ISO/IEC 17021-1, which is very important, because that is THE standard and basis for conformity assessment, which is also applied to ISO/TS 22163.
On the other hand, the IRIS stakeholder group decided since publishing the first IRIS standard, to complement the common competence requirements for auditing and certification of the rail sector specific management system, like other sectors too.
This ensures the consideration of rail specific requirements, which are key for our sector and its stakeholders and that provides confidence in IRIS certification and its further development by the IRQB and its working groups.