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Universal Stylus Initiative Membership Grows to 31 CompaniesThe Universal Stylus Initiative (USI) today announced that its membership has grown to 31 member companies, more than doubling since its launch earlier this year. USI is an organization formed to develop and promote a universal industry specification for an active stylus. When USI was founded in April 2015, 12 companies had come together to develop the standard. The original group included Atmel Corporation; Hanvon Pentech Co., Ltd.; Intel (News - Alert) Corporation; Lenovo Inc.; Sharp Corporation; Synaptics Inc.; Wacom Co., Ltd.; and Waltop International Corp. at the Promoter level; and Dell Global B.V.; eGalax_eMPIA Technology Inc. (EETI); Elan Microelectronics Corporation; and Focal Tech Electronics, Ltd. at the Contributor level. Since that time, leading notebook, tablet and display suppliers ASUSTeK Computer Inc., LG have joined the consortium. Support from stylus providers has expanded with KYE Systems Corp., Primax Electronics Ltd., Solid Year Co. Ltd. and Montblanc Simplo GmbH joining. Additional touch controller suppliers now participating include Parade Technologies, Silicon Integrated Systems Corp., STMicroelectronics (News - Alert) International NV and Raydium Semiconductor Corporation. The full list of member companies can be found on the consortium's website. "We are very pleased to see a wide range of companies joining USI and helping to move it forward," said Peter Mueller, Chairman of the organization. "Having so many join within just six months only validates the need for the standard and the work we're doing. Their help will provide additional push for completion of the specification by the end of the year." The USI specification will make it possible for manufacturers to design products to a single standard, rather than the variety of proprietary approaches now in use, and it will be compatible with multiple OS solutions. USI seeks to provide a consistent user experience while increasing the availability and consumer appeal of the active stylus, while providing industry-wide interoperability and adding functions and features not supported by current styluses. USI continues to accept additional member companies who are ready to be hands-on in completing and promoting a specification to achieve active stylus interoperability. USI welcomes any organization that wants to be involved in this industry initiative. Three levels for participation are available: Promoter, Contributor and Adopter. About Universal Stylus Initiative Launched in 2015, Universal Stylus Initiative (USI) is an international not-for-profit technology trade association whose mission is to define industry-wide standards for interoperable communication between an active stylus and touch-enabled devices such as phones, tablets, and computing and entertainment platforms. The USI specification provides for a stylus capable of communicating with different touch sensors and touch controller integrated circuits, so that users can employ the same stylus across numerous touch-enabled devices, as long as each device's touch controller is compliant with the USI specification. The USI Board members include Atmel Corporation; Hanvon Pentech Co., Ltd.; Intel Corporation; Lenovo Inc.; Sharp Corporation; Synaptics (News - Alert) Inc.; Wacom Co., Ltd.; and Waltop International Corp. Membership in USI is required in order to obtain the specification and to license the IP that it contains. More information about USI and USI technology is available at http://www.universalstylus.org/.
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