EPAM Systems, Inc., the leading software engineering and IT Outsourcing (ITO) provider, with delivery centers in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), announced today that its development center in Kyiv, Ukraine, became an additional outsourcing location meeting the world’s leading security standards.

The Kyiv center has been recently assessed for the SAS 70 Type II requirements by Deloitte Co. Ltd., making EPAM the first company in Central and Eastern Europe with three SAS 70 Type II location certifications, including Budapest, Hungary, and Minsk, Belarus, and now Kyiv, Ukraine, with guarantees of the highest operational security levels.

SAS 70, a Statement on Auditing Standards (SAS) No. 70, Service Organizations, was developed by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) as a method to measure a service organization’s efficiency in providing due controls over sensitive customer data. With the introduction of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which defines means of regulating the controls over financial reporting, the Type II SAS 70 report has been identified as the only acceptable method for a third party to assure a service organization’s controls and financial transparency.

Unlike a Type I report, where the service auditor will express an opinion on controls as of a specific date, in a Type II report the auditor gives an opinion on controls in effect during a particular period of time, making the certification more challenging and meaningful.

Upon the assessment completion, Deloitte’s Enterprise Risk Services Senior Manager Ralph van Uden stated that all controls at EPAM’s Kyiv location were placed in operation, suitably designed, and operating 100% effectively: “The local EPAM team was well prepared and has been very supportive throughout the week to make sure that we could finish our testing in time… We were pleased to see that all controls in scope were tested to be operating effectively.”

As the leading organization, deploying advanced technologies and adhering to the strictest regulatory requirements, EPAM recently completed the beta program for VMware’s Stage Manager, a breakthrough product for accelerating and automating the delivery of applications from staging to production. This and other developments, related to EPAM’s infrastructure and security, contributed to the most recent recognition of EPAM by the Stevie Awards as the finalist in the “Best MIS and IT Organization” category of the 5th annual International Business Awards, with the runner-up Accenture, and the winner British Telecom Group.

“Deploying the IT infrastructure, that meets the stringent requirements for customer data processing, compliant with the world’s leading security and infrastructure standards, is a vital part of EPAM’s enterprise-wide program. It ensures that all our operational facilities apply the same control objectives and management activities, and leverages our investment into our clients’ competitive advantage,” stated Balazs Fejes, EPAM’s CTO. “As the acknowledged software engineering and IT outsourcing leader, EPAM continues to lead within the Central and Eastern European market by setting a high standards bar throughout the region, and worldwide.”