Little is known about Asus' next flagship handset, but the company has pretty much confirmed that the smartphone will include a USB Type-C port.
USB Type-C is the way to go, Asus chair Jonney Shih told TrustedReviews. Shih said that consumers will see the answer when the ZenFone 3 arrives, he said.
As to why there wasn't a USB Type-C port on the ZenFone 2 released earlier this year, Shih pointed to the cost. Asus never only considers just the price of delivering technologies in particular devices, according to Shih.
"We always think about the cost and the value at the same time," said Shih.
It's more of an issue with timing, a matter of finding what time is right to launch which new technologies, according to Shih. Asus wants to be ahead, but sometimes being too far ahead can be disastrous.
"So that's our strategy," said Shih. "We're still not like Apple. [Apple] can always try to lead in a very aggressive way. We would like to be more aggressive than other competitors, but sometimes we also need to be a little bit practical. Make the trade-off, frankly speaking."
The USB Type-C spec has gained support across players of tech industries, including AMD, Google, Hewlett Packard, Intel, Foxconn and a ton of other companies.
The spec has been adopted by Google, Apple and OnePlus. Asus has been a big part of the massive group effort that went into the development of USB Type-C, so much that there were whispers that the company invented the spec.
Daring Fireball's John Gruber found the water heating around him earlier this year when he claimed that 'informed little birdies' told him Apple invented USB Type-C. Gruber, however, later eased off of the suggestion.
"It was a brief aside," stated Gruber. "I certainly didn't mean to imply that no other companies contributed to the final spec. Only that from what I've been told, Apple ought to be getting (and taking) credit as the leading company behind USB-C's innovations."
