萬國法律事務所

National Communications Commission (“NCC”) plans to amend the Regulation of Cell Phone Ratification. To unify diverse specifications of charging port, new cell phones’ charging ports are requested to be in the form of Micro USB of European Union from January 2011. Environment and consumers’ wallets will be therefore benefit from this unification of charging port specifications.

NCC’s action is in view of the fact that 3rd Generation Partnership Project (“3GPP”) positively promotes to unify cell phones’ charging ports in global market. 3GPP schedules 2012 to be the year of execution and Taiwan will execute this policy earlier.

The diverse charging ports result in several problems. For example, after the Flood of 8 August, victims could not use other cell phones’ battery chargers because the charging ports do not fit to each other. In addition to the above, if a new cell phone equips with a new charging port specification, it will result too many meaningless products with the same function and therefore cause severe environmental protection issue. One official of Environmental Protection Bureau agreed with this policy and said that to reduce pollution from its source is an effective and wise decision.

Leading cell phone companies has already followed this policy. Blackberries, HTC HD2, CHT-8000 and Nokia N-Series are changed to use Micro USB as their specifications of charging port. According to an official of NCC, if any charging port specification of any cell phone is non-Micro USB, it will be prohibited from import or sale in Taiwan. However, out-of-date cell phones or ones in stock in Taiwan market are allowed to be sold until they are sold out.