Peter Kenington, Technical Chair of the Open basestation Architecture Initiative, argues that standardisation need not be the enemy of innovation

One oft-cited maxim in the communications world states that standardisation is the enemy of innovation: its premise is that once something is standardised there is, by definition, no room to alter or improve it and hence no remaining freedom in which to innovate. Indeed, this is frequently cited as an argument against standardisation - the 'fact' that it kills innovation.