USB Implementers Forum, Inc. (USB-IF) is a

nonprofit organization A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or so ...

created to promote and maintain USB (Universal Serial Bus), a set of specifications and transmission procedures for a type of cable connection that has since become used widely for electronic equipment. Its main activities are currently the promotion and marketing of USB, Wireless USB, USB On-The-Go, and the maintenance of standards and specifications for the related devices, as well as a compliance program. The USB-IF was initiated in 1995 by the group of companies that was developing USB, which was made available first during 1996. The founding companies of USB-IF were

Compaq Compaq Computer Corporation was an American information technology, information technology company founded in 1982 that developed, sold, and supported computers and related products and services. Compaq produced some of the first IBM PC compati ...

Digital Equipment Corporation Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC ), using the trademark Digital, was a major American company in the computer industry from the 1960s to the 1990s. The company was co-founded by Ken Olsen and Harlan Anderson in 1957. Olsen was president until ...

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Intel Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and Delaware General Corporation Law, incorporated in Delaware. Intel designs, manufactures, and sells computer compo ...

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

, NEC and Nortel. Notable current members include HP, NEC,

, Apple Inc.,

, and Agere Systems. The working committees within USB-IF are: * Device Working Group * Compliance Committee * Marketing Committee The USB-IF web caters to developers who may register freely for the developer web-forums and access documentation. To be part of a working group, however, a person has to work for a member company or register as a member. The developer forums regulate the development of the USB connector, of other USB hardware, and of USB software; they are not

end-user In product development, an end user (sometimes end-user) is a person who ultimately uses or is intended to ultimately use a product. The end user stands in contrast to users who support or maintain the product, such as sysops, system administrato ...

forums. In 2014, the USB-IF announced the availability of USB-C designs. USB-C connectors can transfer data with rates as much as 10 Gbit/s and provides as much as 100

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s of power. In 2015, the seven-person

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, with Jeff Ravencraft as USB-IF President and

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, consisted of representatives of Apple Inc., HP Inc.,

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, Renesas Electronics, STMicroelectronics, and Texas Instruments. In 2020, USB-IF announced updated USB Device Class Definition for MIDI Devices, Version 2.0, for MIDI 2.0 devices.

Vendor ID issuance

A vendor identification is necessary for obtaining a certification of compliance from the USB-IF. The USB-IF is responsible for issuing USB vendor identification numbers to product manufacturers. The cost for issuing this number is US$6,000 per year. Additionally, the use of a trademarked USB logo to identify certified devices requires a license fee of US$3,500 for a 2-year term. Some microcontroller manufacturers offer a free or low cost sublicense of their vendor ID for development/testing and limited production (generally less than 10,000 units). Vendors offering this free service include: * Dream S.A.S. * Energy Micro * FTDI * Luminary Micro * Microchip * NXP * Silicon Labs * STMicroelectronics * Texas Instruments Alternatively, many members of the open source community promote the use of USB VID 0xF055 (which looks when written like " FOSS") for

open-source hardware Open-source hardware (OSH, OSHW) consists of physical artifact (software development), artifacts of technology designed and offered by the open-design movement. Both free and open-source software (FOSS) and open-source hardware are created by th ...

projects. Although this VID is not registered to any company (as of October 2015), the USB-IF have not released any confirmation about reserving it for this particular purpose.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Usb Implementers Forum Implementers Forum Organizations established in 1995 501(c)(6) nonprofit organizations

Vendor ID issuance

See also

References

External links