Blog post by Machiel Bolhuis, director, standards & technology policy EMEA, Oracle
Oracle is committed to creating accessible technologies and products that enhance the overall workplace environment and contribute to the productivity of our employees, customers, and users.
Earlier this year Oracle established a collaboration with the European Disability Forum (EDF), and the aim of the collaboration is to raise awareness on key accessibility standards and support the accessibility community.
Alejandro Moledo, EDF’s deputy director and head of policy, said:
EDF welcomes the collaboration with Oracle in raising awareness about ICT accessibility standards. We appreciate Oracle’s commitment to creating increasingly accessible technologies and products for the workplace, and hope that businesses and disability organisations like ours keep working together towards a more inclusive and accessible society.
Luke Kowalski, senior VP in Oracle’s corporate architecture group, said:
The collaboration with the European Disability Forum supports our vision on accessibility that is built on collaboration, innovation, and standardisation. Through the collaboration we are able to understand the requirements from a diverse set of accessibility stakeholders and provide solutions to the broadest range of our customers.”
The first joint activity between Oracle and EDF included an online webinar that discussed how standards improve accessibility in ICT and can support the implementation of accessibility legislation. The online webinar took place on September 19, and in the webinar Oracle, EDF, AccessibleEU, and the Joint Accessibility Working Group of the European Standardisation Organisations presented their views on how standards improve accessibility in ICT. EDF has published a blog post on the webinar.
During the webinar, the leader of the Oracle Accessibility Program Office at Oracle, Kent Boucher, presented Oracle’s approach to accessibility. In addition, Oracle’s Chuck Adams discussed the future of ICT standards in a panel with others. He stressed that Oracle’s leadership in accessibility standards and industry consortia enables it to drive innovations in global web accessibility and create accessible products for our customers. For example, currently Oracle serves as co-chair for W3C’s Accessibility Guidelines Working Group, as editor of WCAG 2.2 and WCAG2ICT, and participates in the Aria Working Group of the W3C. Additionally, Oracle served as a chair and contributing member for Information Technology Industry (ITI) Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) version 2.3. Leadership in accessibility standards and industry consortia enable Oracle to drive innovations in global web accessibility and create accessible products for our customers, and Oracle leads in supporting the existing standards and the creation of new standards.
Accessibility is at the heart of Oracle. Similar initiatives as with EDF have been ongoing with the National Federation of the Blind and Teach Access. In collaboration with professional organizations, Oracle amplifies the impact for all persons globally. Oracle relies on these organizations and their members to understand requirements from a diverse set of existing and potential Oracle users.
Oracle’s commitment to accessibility is part of our broader commitment of building standards-based products to help customers reduce complexity and get the most out of their existing technology investments. We build our products, which are used daily by millions of people across dozens of industries in countries worldwide, on standards developed by international organizations and industry consortia. In addition to standards organizations, Oracle is both a contributor and leader in open source communities – we are a supporting member of the Linux Foundation, Cloud Native Computing Foundation, Eclipse Foundation, and the Java Community Process program, among others. Oracle participates actively in more than 100 standards-setting organizations and more than 300 technical committees, and thousands of our employees are actively engaged in standards or open source projects.
More information about Oracle’s work on standards and accessibility can be found at Oracle’s Accessibility Program website and on the Standards at Oracle website .