Not long ago, the EU passed a rule that required manufacturers of phones and other small devices to equip their devices with USB Type-C ports. The EU government wants to reduce the number of proprietary chargers in landfills. Now other countries are joining the effort.
The other day representatives from India confirmed that USB Type-C will become the standard charging port for mobile devices starting in March 2025. Secretary Rohit Kumar Singh told The Economic Times, “When it comes to chargers, there is a global supply chain, so we have to meet global deadlines. The goal is to reduce the number of chargers per household, thereby minimizing the amount of electronic waste generated.“
The Indian government also backed up its decision with a commitment to care for the environment. The logic behind this decision is that if more devices use the same cables and chargers, they can be reused for different devices instead of being thrown away when the new device has a different charging method. However, the EU recommendations will go into effect on December 28, 2024, which is a few months earlier than the deadline for India.
Since India is the second most populous country in the world and is a vibrant market, this would make most manufacturers who don’t want to lose this market to Type-C. Otherwise, they would risk losing a huge potential market.
Of course, the biggest question is how Apple will deal with this situation as they remain one of the few major mobile device manufacturers who still use their signature Lightning port instead of the Type-C one. Although Apple has not been very popular in India in the past, the situation has just started to change. According to recent reports, the iPhone 13 was India’s most popular premium smartphone in the third quarter of 2022. It beat out competitors from Samsung and OnePlus.
It has long been rumored that Apple will not fight those decisions, and the iPhone 15 will be released already with a USB Type-C port. These smartphones should be available by 2024, not to mention 2025.
