NEW YORK, March 30, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Uptime Institute (http://www.uptimeinstitute.org/), an industry thought leader in research, education and consulting for all aspects of the data center, today announced the completed Certification of the design of five Datacraft onecloud data centers in India as Tier III Concurrently Maintainable. A Tier III Certification signifies true 24x7 availability as the data centers are designed specifically to ensure that no downtime occurs due to equipment maintenance or replacement.

A total of six Datacraft onecloud data centers will receive Uptime Institute's Design and Facility Certification this year. Upon completion, this will represent the largest portfolio of Tier Certified data centers in the world. Datacraft's design-build partner for all of these sites is Emerson Network Power India.

Uptime Institute is currently processing 11 Tier III and IV Certifications in India alone. These agreements, all signed within the last four months, demonstrate the level of demand and explosive growth of the Indian market for highly available data centers.

"Datacraft exemplifies market leadership in India with Uptime Institute's Tiers Classification and Certification System, distinguishing Datacraft as exceptional among Indian providers with independent verification of continuous availability," said Martin McCarthy, Uptime Institute executive chairman. "Tier Certification is insurance for substantial data center investment without impacting or restricting important speed to market. We anticipate that Tier Certification will become commonly adopted in the booming Indian data center market by top enterprises and service providers who want to assure investment value and ensure that business objectives of availability can be met."

"The fact that all six of our data center facilities in India will be Uptime Institute Tier III Certified by the end of 2011 illustrates our commitment to deliver best-in-class services," said Dilip Kumar, COO of Datacraft Asia, Pte Ltd. "These facilities, built in partnership with BSNL, operate under the brand onecloud - and provide a comprehensive range of co-location, hosted, cloud and managed services, particularly to the government and public sectors. With the Uptime Institute Certification, our clients can be assured that our IT services provide business continuity, security and system availability to world-class standards. Tier III Certification gives our data centers a mark of excellence."

"These Certifications demonstrate that the Tiers are both applicable and recognizable around the world. The Tier system allows comparison and recognition of data center strength and sophistication that transcend borders or time zones," said Julian Kudritzki, Vice President of Uptime Institute. "In India and the 29 other countries where we are awarding Tier Certifications to data centers, there is no conflict between code, regulation, or law and the Uptime Institute's Standards."

Tier Certification is a third-party, unbiased validation of a data center's capability to perform maintenance or respond to a fault without affecting the data center's availability. It is the only Certification to the Uptime Institute's Tier Classification System (Tier I-IV).