Custom data structures are often created to support a company s unique services. For example, telecom carriers are reluctant to reveal voice system records because these records define the competitive features of their services. The telephone provides a useful analogy. Phones offer a nearly universal means of communication, with the speech they carry being the common method of understanding between the parties involved. But if one caller is speaking English and the person on the other end understands only Japanese, no information will be shared.
Computers are similar.
The network provides the infrastructure while the hardware and software define the common mode of exchange. The price is unsustainable. When Sprint introduced its PCS services in 1996, for example, it had to do so without adequate billing systems. Market share had to be captured immediately even though back office interoperability meant that Sprint s billing systems could not catch up until a year or so later. The Interoperability Quagmire Traditionally, conversions have involved the expensive and time-consuming development of custom software.