Industries
Sector expertise, not template consulting
Every sector answers to different buyers, regulators and audit expectations. These are the nine we work in most, and the standards each one is usually asked for.
Automotive
26 standards apply to this sector.
Chemicals
16 standards apply to this sector.
Construction
16 standards apply to this sector.
Electricals and Electronics
8 standards apply to this sector.
Food and Food Products
15 standards apply to this sector.
Hotels, Restaurants and Leisure
14 standards apply to this sector.
Medical Devices
14 standards apply to this sector.
Public Sector
25 standards apply to this sector.
Transport and Logistics
12 standards apply to this sector.
Defence
10 standards apply to this sector.
Pharmaceutical
12 standards apply to this sector.
Solar
9 standards apply to this sector.
Telecommunication
20 standards apply to this sector.
Education
9 standards apply to this sector.
Energy
20 standards apply to this sector.
Information Technology
25 standards apply to this sector.
Textile
13 standards apply to this sector.
Banking and Finance
23 standards apply to this sector.
Railways
10 standards apply to this sector.
Import and Export
19 standards apply to this sector.
Manufacturing
31 standards apply to this sector.
Oil and Gas
17 standards apply to this sector.
Tobacco
5 standards apply to this sector.
Tourism
8 standards apply to this sector.
How standards meet a sector
Why a generic standard becomes a sector requirement
Management system standards are written to apply to any organisation, which is their strength and the reason they feel abstract on first reading. ISO 9001 never mentions an engine block or a batch record. What turns it into a sector requirement is the party asking: an automotive customer, a retailer, a regulator or a tender committee, each with a view of what good looks like in their own supply chain.
So the standard is the same and the evidence is not. A quality objective in a pharmaceutical plant is a batch release record; in a software business it is a release gate. Sector pages exist because the gap between the clause and the evidence is where most implementation time goes.
Sector schemes sit on top of the generic standards
Several industries have their own scheme built on an ISO base. IATF 16949 extends ISO 9001 for automotive and adds the core tools and customer-specific requirements. FSSC 22000 combines ISO 22000 with a sector prerequisite programme. TISAX draws on ISO/IEC 27001 and adds automotive requirements for prototype protection and subcontractor management.
The practical consequence is that the generic certificate is a foundation rather than a substitute. An organisation holding ISO 9001 is a long way into IATF 16949 and is not finished, and treating the two as interchangeable is the most expensive misunderstanding available in that sector.
Which standards a sector is actually asked for
Most organisations need fewer than they fear and different ones than they expect. The ones that matter are the ones a customer, a regulator or a tender has named — not the longest list a consultancy can produce. Each sector page sets out the standards that sector is genuinely asked for, and which of them your buyers are most likely to name first.
They overlap more than their titles suggest, and a single management system can carry several of them, audited together. That is the difference between one annual audit and three, and it is decided at the design stage rather than afterwards.
Not sure which standard your sector needs?
Tell us who is asking - a buyer, a regulator, a tender committee - and we will tell you exactly what satisfies them.
