Cisco Certified Design Expert - CCDE - officially released by Cisco

Today was the official release date for the CCDE exam. To quote Cisco: “CCDE Assesses advanced Network Infrastructure Design Principles and Fundamentals for large networks. A CCDE can demonstrate an ability to develop solutions which address planning, design, integration, optimization, operations, security and ongoing support focused at the infrastructure level for customer networks”

For the engineering perspective on this, the CCDE is equivalent to the CCIE. However, the CCDE is focused on design and architecture rather than implementation. Where the CCIE (R&S, Voice, Security, Service Provider, Storage) is focused on implementation, the CCDE is focused more on the pre-sales design and architecture efforts. I am personally looking forward to the lab being released, as it provides a certification to validate the skill set needed to be a sales engineer on Enterprise accounts, or to be a network architect at an Enterprise corporation.

It is funny how small a world it is. Eplus (the company I work for) CEO - Phil Norton was quoted on Cisco’s press release:

“Certifications provide a stamp of approval that validates the quality of our organization’s employees,” said Phil Norton, chairman, CEO and president of ePlus. “The CCDE isn’t about operations; it’s about recognizing the value of network designers and honoring their core skills that provide a real value to our business and our customers.”

My gut feel when I first got invited to the CCDE beta program was that this will become a requirement for the Channel. I think Phil’s statement cements that gut feel into a reality. Obtaining a CCDE will become similar to the CCIE - a check box that you must attain to work with the top VARs out there. This makes me extremely grateful that I was lucky enough to be invited into the beta group to be allowed first crack at this gem of a certification.