Many different standards organizations have attempted to apply SOA to the telecommunications sector using a variety of different approaches. Unfortunately, all these fragmented efforts have resulted in gaps that prevent SOA standards from delivering the integration and interoperability that telecommunications providers need.

The most practical, effective way to address these gaps is within the organization that is responsible for defining the core SOA standards. OASIS is home, not only to SCA, SDO, and SOA-RM--but also to related standards such as BPEL, WS-Security, WS-Federation, WS-Transaction, UDDI, ebXML, SAML, XACML, and UBL.

The OASIS Telecom Member Section gives participants:

• the freedom to maintain a clear focus on telecommunications services in a SOA framework;
• the proximity to influence and contribute to core SOA standards development;
• the flexibility to create tightly-focused committees under the respected OASIS process.

The OASIS membership roster includes most of the SOA product providers as well as many of the largest telecommunications companies. The consortium is open to new participation and offers a variety of membership options to enable others to join easily.