USB Implementers Forum

The USB-IF was initiated on 5 December 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, Digital Equipment Corporation, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, NEC and Nortel. Notable current members include HP, NEC, Microsoft, Apple Inc., Intel, and Broadcom.

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 forums.

In 2014, the USB-IF announced the availability of USB Type-C designs. USB-C connectors were introduced with transfer data with rates as much as 10 Gbit/s and provides as much as 100 watts of power.

In 2015, the seven-person board of directors, with Jeff Ravencraft as USB-IF president and chief operating officer, consisted of representatives of Apple Inc., HP Inc., Intel Corporation, Microsoft Corporation, 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 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.