(ANSI: New York) -- The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) has signed an agreement to acquire full interests in the ANSI-ASQ National Accreditation Board LLC (ANAB), strengthening ANSI’s and ANAB’s abilities to provide the highest quality third-party accreditation services for diverse global markets. The transaction with the American Society for Quality (ASQ) is scheduled to close on Dec. 28, 2018. Since 2005, ANAB has been owned equally by ANSI and ASQ; the purchase will result in ANAB becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of ANSI, registered as a separate legal entity and renamed the ANSI National Accreditation Board (ANAB).

While the two brands will continue business as usual in the near term, ANSI will further bolster independence and impartiality of its accreditation programs for conformity assessment bodies by integrating them with ANAB’s portfolio of services. ANSI’s accreditation of standards developers and U.S. Technical Advisory Groups (TAGs) to international technical committees will remain separately and internally operated by ANSI.

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