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CompTIA UK Cloud Essentials Launch

On 6 March 2012, CompTIA UK held a launch event for the Cloud Essentials exam. It’s been a long time since CompTIA (or any other vendor) has promoted a singular exam – so this had to be something special.

The Cloud Essentials exam signifies how CompTIA have repositioned their certifications to follow a track. Previously, the IT industry saw the CompTIA exams as a vendor neutral starting place from which you could specialise into Microsoft, Cisco, VMWare, HP etc.

The new CompTIA strategy is to develop an IT Professional through certifications with the following track:

Foundation (Strata IT Fundamentals) > Speciality Series (Cloud, Green IT, Healthcare, Sales) > Professional (A+, Network+, Security+ etc.) > Master (CASP and more coming soon!)

The Cloud Essentials Exam fits into the speciality series and will be followed by the Virtualization Essentials exam later this year. The Cloud/Virtualization track will also introduce new Master exams for Cloud Consultants / Virtualization Experts. This is most likely to be introduced in 2013 as the industry are still developing their cloud offerings and platforms.

The Cloud Essentials exam is supposed to be “non-technical” and is aimed at all levels of IT Professionals i.e. technicians, Administrators, IT Managers/Decision Makers. This is quite a bold stance that CompTIA have taken as there is no clear definition for whom the exam is for – and may be its biggest challenge in order to galvanise the IT Professional community to take this exam.

The Objective Domains for the exam demonstrate the range of acronyms that have emerged through the introduction of Cloud technology within the IT industry and has a robust set of criteria that a Candidate should know in order to successfully take and pass the exam.

ITPrenuers and Skillsoft were the two major forces behind the development of the exam. ITPreneurs took the lead in the development as the course came about due to a Dutch Bank asking them to deliver a vendor-neutral Cloud course. As there were none in the industry at the time, they created their own in conjunction with subject matter experts from leading IT companies. In order to certify the individuals, CompTIA worked in conjunction with a larger pool of IT companies to develop the exam. Hence, even though the exam may be non-technical it is definitely in demand by the industry expecting the current and future generations of the IT workforce to have a strong understanding of Cloud Technology.

Exam Quick Facts

Name: CompTIA Cloud Essentials

Exam Code: CLO-001

Number of questions: 50

Passing score: 720/900

Standard Retail Price: £128

Exam Delivery Vendor: Pearson Vue / Prometric (only until the end of June as Pearson Vue is now the exclusive  delivery vendor for CompTIA exams)