A Common Charger for All Phones? The E.U. Is on the Case

Officials also say that a common kind of charger would reduce consumers’ cost because devices could be sold without a dedicated charger.

This is not the first time the European Union has tackled this topic. This week’s effort was the third attempt to untangle charging devices in more than a decade.

In 2009, when there were more than 30 different chargers on the market, the European Commission, the bloc’s executive arm, reached a voluntary agreement with industry giants like Apple, Samsung and Nokia to introduce a smartphone charger that fit all models.

But the agreement expired in 2014, and the device makers went their separate ways.

Lawmakers then introduced a similar effort to re-establish a voluntary standard for a single charging port for all smartphones. But that initiative was never adopted, in part because it failed to guarantee interoperability between devices such as speakers and keyboards with smartphones.

There are now three major types of charging plugs, according to the European Consumer Organization, which backs the effort to standardize chargers: USB 2.0 Micro B, USB-C and Apple’s Lightning.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/17/business/european-union-phone-charger.html?emc=rss&partner=rss