News: Mobile chargers to unify

Leading manufacturers of mobile phones have announced that from 2010 onwards, universal chargers will be available for mobile phones.

Long a bug-bear of users, incompatibility between chargers has meant a wasteful – not to mention irritating – disposal problem when a new phone is purchased.

Sometimes even same-brand mobile phones carried slightly different and incompatible chargers.

Now the major brands Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, Apple, Motorola, Research In Motion (Blackberry) and NEC have committed to developing a standard for phone charging based on the micro-USB interface.

This agreement is specific to the EU at the moment, but universal chargers are expected to become standard around the globe.