News: EU Cell Makers Adopt Standard MicroUSB Charger

On Monday, all of Europe's top mobile telephone suppliers—including Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola, Apple, LG, NEC, Qualcomm, Research in Motion and Samsung—agreed to back an EU-wide harmonization of phone chargers, Reuters reported that the European Commission said. Starting next year, all new cell phones will share the same MicroUSB connection hardware. So what does the news mean for you and your apartment?

Well our European Apartment Therapy fans will now be able to enjoy the luxury of having all the phones in your house charged on one same cord.

That's sure to make bedside tables and kitchen counters a lot less cluttered! We can only hope that the good old USA follows suit. (US manufacturers agreed to do this two years ago, but so far we're all still making friends with another BlackBerry addict in the office to bum a charge)

What do you think? Is a standardization of cell phone chargers the way to go? Or is this just unnecessary intervention? At the very least, you can admit it's a way better option than lugging around this eyesore to charge your family's cells. Let us know in the comments!

Top image from Andrew Currie on Flickr with a Creative Commons license.

Comments (3)

surely apple will not forego their precious dock connector. or add another unsightly port to their flagship?

posted by samwhatam on July 2nd 2009 at 9:36am
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Apple will probably use some sort of connector/plug, microUSB on one end and dock connector on the other. I think this is a good idea reducing the number of phone chargers one needs in a household esp if you have more than a couple of brands of phone.

posted by jkyeoman on July 2nd 2009 at 8:16pm
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I think it's awesome. Fortunately, my last two phones have been Samsung phones. So I have two chargers and can keep one at home and one for travel/work.

If they were all standard, I could switch brands and easily have the same convenience. It would certainly make me more willing to purchase an extra charger if I knew I could use it on other phones (if I do switch brands).

posted by wunami on July 11th 2009 at 9:59pm
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