Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp intends to release detailed specifications of its Multivendor Integration Architecture Version 1 on February 15, several years after the notion was first discussed. The Architecture, which is described as a means of standardising purchasing requirements, has been developed together with NTT Data Communications Systems Corp, IBM Japan Ltd, Nippon DEC, NEC Corp, Hitachi Ltd and Fujitsu Ltd. The phone company claims that the architecture will enable the creation of systems comprising different vendors’ computers, but how that will be achieved is still unclear. Of the various members of the consortium, DEC seems to gained the most. It is claiming that its Application & Control System has been selected as the transaction processing model and that the Multivendor Integration Architecture specification is based on the same philosophy as DEC’s Network Application Support. According to Electronic News, Nippon Telephone has spent the past 18 months deciding which existing standards are best for the Application Program Interface, the System Interconnection Interface and Human interface. It has stated that the Architectire is premised on existing operating systems, but in areas that have not been standardised, the emphasis is on what is necessary from the user’s standpoint. Electronic News believes that the architecture will set specifications in applications for C, Cobol, and Fortran as well database access languages like SQL. There are specifications for upper-layer protocols while the lower layer protocol is based on Internet and Open Systems Interconnection. As regards screens and operating methods, the US trade weekly claims that the standards specify OSF/Motif, Open Look and IBM’s Common User Access from Systems Application Architecture. To describe the new architecture as a means of standardising purchasing requirements is to understate its significance. The Japanese phone company, which came out with the specification after deciding to phase out its proprietary DIPS mainframes, has enough purchasing power to influence the way Japanese manufacturers operate, and if the Architecture is adopted elsewhere, the ramifications could be far reaching, not least for IBM. While DEC looks likely to increase its business with NTT, and reap other strategic benefits, IBM Japan may find that Multivendor Integration Architecture-compliance will undermine the Systems Application Architecture base. Electronic News suggests that computers designed under the new architecture are to be targeted by Nippon Telegraph’s NTT Data subsidiary at banks and airlines, and the Japanese government is also a large NTT customer. The attitude of Japanese customers is said to be key to developing the Multivendor Inetgration Architecture. Banks often demand that NTT use computers from a banking subsidiary, for example Fuji Bank and Fujitsu Ltd, but the architecture should reduce the costs of installing a variety of proprietary systems and different applications software.
