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2013/12/18 USB 3.0 Promoter Group Announces New Type-C Connector for USB


By:  Greg Potter

The USB 3.0 Promoter Group announced the development of the next generation connector for the USB specification. The design will be released in the first quarter of 2014, while the connector should be finalized by the middle of 2014, according to the USB 3.0 Promoter Group. The new USB Type-C is being developed to help enable even thinner consumer electronics products, and help the specification to remain relevant in the face of an increasingly wireless world.

Figure 1 Pin Layout for USB 3.0 Micro-B Connector



Source: MRG

Although the design of the connector hasn’t been finalized, the new Type-C connector will be smaller than the USB 3.0 Micro-B connector shown above, and should be roughly the size of the USB 2.0 Micro-B connector. The Type-C connector will also support the faster (up to 10 Gbps) USB 3.1 speeds. According the USB 3.0 Promoter Group, the new standard will also support all of the power profiles, up to 100W of power, in the USB Power Delivery specification.

Similarly to Apple’s Lightning connector, the new connector is not orientation-specific. No more fumbling in the dark to plug your smartphone into the charger only to turn the lights on to realize you’ve been trying to plug the connector in upside down the whole time.

MRG Analysis:

The USB 3.0 Micro-B connector has not seen much adoption in its intended mobile device market. As of now, there is exactly one smartphone with a USB 3.0 Micro-B connector, the Samsung Galaxy Note 3. The port has had trouble finding traction in the mobile device market because of its larger size and the USB 2.0 Micro-B port is seen as a “good enough” solution for a lower price point than a USB 3.0 connector.

The use case scenario for a higher-speed USB port is also being negated in mobile devices by the advent of cloud services and fast wireless data protocols like 802.11ac. It used to be that the USB port in mobile devices was used to transfer music and video to and from a desktop or laptop computer, but with cloud storage solutions for music and streaming music services, the need to store music locally is much less than in the past. The same goes for video as well. Netflix, Hulu, and others can stream video directly to the phone via a Wi-Fi, or if need be, a cellular connection. And for times when you need to move video from the mobile device to a computer or television, wireless protocols like Wi-Fi, DLNA, Miracast, AirPlay, and their associated proprietary cousins like SmartShare from LG or AllShare Cast from Samsung, enable the video to be streamed from the phone to the television or computer without wires. Wireless power is also seeing some gains among mobile devices, such as Google’s Nexus 4 and Samsung Galaxy S4. While usage is not very high as of yet, the outlook for the technology is good, and presents a long-term threat to the wired USB port in mobile devices.

Wired connections in mobile devices are not going anywhere though, and since adoption of the USB 3.0 Micro-B connector has been sparse at best, now is an excellent time to update the port. The upgrade to a simpler orientation-agnostic connector, while seemingly humble, will please most consumers because it makes things simpler in an increasingly complicated world. And while wireless is always nice to have for tech-savvy consumers, the fact is wired connections are simpler for the less tech-savvy consumer to operate and the main reason that wired connections will be around for quite a while. 

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