Microsoft puts aside past rivalry with OASIS over document formats, to joins its campaign for smart meter standard.
International standards organisation OASIS has launched a new group aimed at developing standards to promote the adoption of so-called smart energy grids – and welcomed past rival Microsoft on board.
Open standards body OASIS said this week that it has formed the Energy Interoperation Technical Committee to develop web services for dealing with the communication systems for smart grids as well as pricing, reliability and emergency signals.
The announcement comes amid controversy over smart grids, with UK utilities accused of lobbying to limit them. The UK government plans to install them across Britain, and the US is spending $2 billion on smart grids. Meanwhile, US organisations are concerned over security issues.
Microsoft’s support comes despite a past long-running rivalry between Microsoft and OASIS in an unrelated field, where Microsoft’s OOXML document format clashed with OASIS’ OpenDocument Format (ODF).
via Microsoft Joins OASIS Standard For Smart Grids – News – eWeekEurope.co.uk.
