IEEE makes standards for manufacturers to follow. Without those standards, there would more "proprietary" hardware, and said hardware would be more expensive.
For example,
If you pick up an internet-capable electronic device, it is going to have some form of 802.xxx, which is a standard set by the IEEE, whether it be 802.11n, 802.11ac, 802.3, etc.
Without those standards, any given electronic device could have a different method of data transfer to connect to a network, and that particular method of connecting would have to be matched with the corresponding router.