TM Forum's Open APIs are seeing greater adoption but vendor support continues to lag behind communications service provider (CSP) demand, according to a recent report from the trade organization.

Many CSPs are taking a do-it-yourself (DIY) approach to Open API implementation while they wait for vendors to catch up and that demand represents a market opportunity for vendors that can act quickly, according to TM Forum.

"The results of this quarter's survey show that the average maturity level of Open APIs is 26% higher for CSPs than for vendors. This gap is indicative of CSPs undertaking significant DIY activity," the report reads.

TM Forum says the goal of its Open APIs is to enable zero-touch interoperability and partnering to reduce IT integration and maintenance costs. TM Forum's suite features more than 50 REST-based Open APIs designed to enable end-to-end interoperability. The trade organization claims these APIs are critical for CSPs because they enable hardware from different vendors to interoperate.

To date, 53 CSPs and technology companies have signed on to TM Forum's Open API initiative. Those organizations have committed to incorporate the Open APIs into their products or otherwise require them as part of their request for proposal (RFP) process. They are also encouraged to participate in the broader TM Forum Collaboration program.

"The majority of our Open API implementations to date have been wrapping our product vendors' legacy APIs," said Lester Thomas, chief IT systems architect at Vodafone Group, who was cited in the report. He added that Vodafone has started to see more native TM Forum Open API implementations from vendors.

Outside of the telecom sector, Thomas also reported that enterprises were showing increased demand for zero-touch partnering Open APIs. "In the enterprise space, we are also seeing some enterprise customers mandating the use of Open APIs as part of their RFPs," he said in a statement.