The Battle Within

Abstract

This paper addresses the concept of internal standards fragmentation in networked technologies - occurring when two or more products remain non-interoperable for an intended service, even though being perfectly compliant to the same core interface compatibility standard. Two main sources of internal fragmentation are identified (“configurational” and “competitive”). A case study is done on the historically observed internal fragmentation within the DVB-H and T-DMB mobile digital multimedia broadcasting standards. It is argued that internal standards fragmentation has important consequences hitherto unaddressed in the literature, including potentially undermining the effects of interoperability and economies of scale expected to follow from the adoption of a single standard. Implications for research, policy and practice are discussed, and advice for further research is provided.