In a nutshell: Within the brief time period, the EU’s Radio Gear Directive will make two out of 5 used smartphones within the area out of date as a result of they don’t have USB-C chargers. For the long run, the brand new regulation may result in innovation in wi-fi charging applied sciences and new enterprise fashions that concentrate on retrofitting older gadgets with USB-C ports. The directive may additionally immediate producers to discover extra sustainable supplies to scale back e-waste.
The EU’s Radio Gear Directive, set to take impact on the finish of this yr, would require all cell gadgets to help USB-C charging. The laws goals to scale back e-waste by standardizing chargers, however its sensible affect can be to make eight million used smartphones, representing $2.22 billion in potential gross sales, successfully out of date within the area.
The affect can be far-reaching, affecting each major and secondary smartphone markets. CCS Insights estimates that 60 % of secondhand smartphones won’t help USB-C when the directive is applied.
“The USB-C mandate will pressure the still-emerging round business, which has already seen a number of firms stop buying and selling this yr due to robust market circumstances,” Simon Bryant, Vice President of Analysis at CCS Perception informed The Register. “It additionally dangers pushing buying and selling into unregulated channels and is prone to promote parallel imports bypassing EU customs.”
The EU is a serious importer of used telephones, primarily from the US, Japan, and Singapore. The ban applies to imported fashions, however used telephones with non-compliant ports can nonetheless be bought inside member states.
The directive has been beneath growth for years, with discussions about standardizing chargers launching in 2011. In 2014, MicroUSB was initially accredited because the connector design of selection. The frequent charging normal was proposed in January 2020 and handed with 582 votes to 40.
Apple initially opposed the regulation, citing considerations about stifling innovation, however later did an about-face and confirmed it was switching to USB-C for the iPhone 15 line-up a yr in the past. Cupertino is a serious pressure within the world secondhand smartphone market, comprising 62 % of total volumes, or 17 million iPhones, whereas Samsung has a 20 % market share. Final yr, 117 million secondhand telephones have been shipped worldwide, and CCS Insights expects that this yr the numbers can be even higher.
Now, the discharge of the iPhone 16 may nicely flood the market with pre-USB-C fashions – assuming Apple Intelligence can be a sufficiently big draw to persuade shoppers to ditch their present gadgets and purchase the newest Apple providing.
However, shoppers are maintaining their older telephones longer, and after they do commerce up, many are choosing second-hand fashions. Half of shoppers polled in a Vodafone-backed survey earlier this yr stated they’re considering shopping for a refurbished smartphone as a substitute of a brand-new handset, citing the decrease buy worth and environmental considerations as the principle causes.
E-waste is a serious challenge for the EU, which estimates that outdated chargers contributed to 51,000 metric tons of digital waste a decade in the past, lowered to 11,000 tons lately. The Radio Gear Directive was crafted partly to scale back end-of-life electronics, however it could paradoxically result in a rise in discarded gadgets within the brief time period.