Based on Apple’s recent behavior it could be said that they don’t care too much about EU regulations. Apple is still getting into scandals over trying to sell a 2-year warranty extension in its EU-based stores despite 2-years being a standard they must offer with any product. Then there’s the charger issue, has been a major push to adopt a universal standard in order to cut charger waste through proprietary ports, but it seems, once again that Apple is not complying.

It doesn’t have to maket he change right away but by 2017 it may be forced to comply  to this standard as Apple offers two types of ports on its smartphones and tablets that contribute to charger waste. The old 30-pin connector on older models and the new Lightning port comes to mind and although they fit with the design concepts of Apple’s devices, it has been noted that millions of these White cable and dongles have gone to waste in the last 5 years.

A new EU regulation could change that, thoughas it will force all manufacturers to use a micro USB charger from 2017 onward if it is successful. The EU Council of Ministers has already given the new law the go ahead, so it seems very likely to pass and become universal.

The company could of course choose to ignore the new law and carry on shipping its own proprietary charger and judging by how it treats EU laws already, you really can’t rule that out as a route they’ll take. Such laws wouldn’t affect Apple until we are preparing to witness the launch of the iPhone 9 and the new new new iPad by 2017. Something on either side will definitely need to change: Either Apple will surprise everyone and switch to using a micro USB port in the coming years, every new device will ship with a Lightning to micro USB adapter, the latter is what we are expecting.