This guide proposes characteristics to help assess the service maturity of a service via the operational definition of the Technology Readiness Level (TRL) indicators: TRL, 7, 8 and 9.
TRL 7
EC definition: "System prototype demonstration in operational environment"
Service has passed through development and is an advanced stage of pre-production: the software is stable, reliable and has been deployed in an operational environment
Functionality as required by the target users is documented, understood, validated with target sample users and accepted by them. Internal documentation exists regarding preliminary validation tests.
An assessment has been made of the required load of the system once the transition into production is complete and a plan has been made to service this load. This assessment has been documented.
An SLA is optional.
TRL 8
EC description: "System complete and qualified"
There are users who are making real use of the service and rely on it for their work.
Service documentation for end-users exists and is made available.
An acceptable use policy/terms of use is in place.
An SLA is in place, with service level targets defined and delivered service level targets periodically reported to the customer. The existence of an SLA implies the following:
Basic (e.g. port up) and functional monitoring in place
Provision is made for user support, with response to incident and problem management is as per SLA
TRL 9
EC description: "Actual system proven in operational environment"
All requirements of TRL 8 are met.
Customer feedback is gathered and documented. The service has been in a production state and relied upon by users for at least 1 year and evidence is provided to show this.
There are quantitative outputs as a direct result of the service usage.
SLA is in place and monitored
