Our customers need to be agile so they can not only stay ahead of the competition, but also be able to quickly change the underlying behavior and logic of their strategic business systems in customer service, new product development and marketing.
The same logic applies to public subsidies for any good or service where producers enjoy significant monopoly power: Direct provision of public goods has market forces on its side, while subsidies for private purchases work against the market.
In the circular logic of markets, Japan is safe and can continue to service its gargantuan debts indefinitely because the interest rate it pays is low.
Much of the work around service oriented architecture in recent years has been to promote the de-coupling of business logic from underlying technology.