providers have different systems for these steps and need humans to "glue" them together. Service providers are finding that integrating their various systems can save much money. Equally important, system integration allows the service provider to do things they could not do before, such as telling customers that their service will be available within a few hours, rather than days or weeks. Of course, in integrating systems, interfaces are needed and common standards are preferable so that custom interfaces need not be built for every pair of systems. Expensive integration work is currently the norm in achieving end-to-end man- agement. However, organisations such as the Telemanagement Forum encouraging the adoption of standards. They are also facilitating joint efforts between OSS ven- dors and service providers to develop, implement and adhere to interface standards so that software from different vendors can be clicked together like Lego blocks. Unified management is about using a single system to manage network infra- structure. For example, many network operators have many systems for their net- work inventory - and some of those systems include Excel spreadsheets, Post-it notes and assorted other paraphernalia. Yet, there is great value in having network inventory in a single system. For example, end-to-end service provisioning is not possible without unified inventory management. The provisioning and activation of appropriate network resources cannot be automated unless all network inventory is available and stored in a single format or, at least, is in electronic form and accessi- ble from a single system. 1.2 Standardisation It can never be expected that a single system or approach will solve all problems, or even be appropriate. This is especially so for network management software because telecom networks are constantly growing and changing. The business and strategic expense of having ineffective management software or of being unable to manage the latest telecom network technology can be enormous. S