Context
Most enterprise software is built on proprietary data formats. Each vendor has its own ontology, its own export schema, its own definition of 'an asset' or 'a requirement'. Migrating from one platform to another typically means re-encoding the data, assuming you can extract it at all. This is acceptable for tools you might replace every five years. It is not acceptable for assets that operate for fifty.
Open standards exist to solve a specific business problem: data has to outlive the software that created it.
Explanation
Three properties of open standards make them the only durable foundation for long-lived assets:
Data outlives software
A nuclear plant operates for 60+ years. Over that span, every software vendor in existence today will have either disappeared, been acquired, or fundamentally reinvented their product. The data describing the asset must be readable independent of those changes.
Standards are public and durable
RDF has been a W3C recommendation since 1999. SPARQL since 2008. ISO 19650 published in 2018 and only growing in adoption. These specifications outlive companies because they are maintained by standards bodies, not by vendors.
Vendor competition becomes possible
When the data structure is public, any competent integrator can pick up the work. Customers retain leverage. Vendors compete on quality, not lock-in. Building on open standards is also what makes Weaver itself replaceable, and we consider that a feature.
Building on open standards is the most reliable way to give an asset programme a future. The architectural choice has nothing to do with ideology and everything to do with engineering risk management on a 70-year horizon.