Intel announces plans for Thunderbolt 3 as an open standard

After almost 20 years with the same physical connector, USB Type-C was introduced, which is intended to eventually completely replace traditional Type-A. The advantage of Type-C is that it is small and reversible, which makes it suitable for everything from smart phones to larger devices such as laptops and desktops.

In addition to physical differences, the connector enables faster protocols as well as other interfaces such as Displayport for image transfer. Intel has also chosen to embrace USB Type-C for Thunderbolt 3, which combines PCI Express and Displayport and delivers a bandwidth of as much as 40 Gbps.

The use of Thunderbolt has been limited since commercialization in 2011, largely as it is a proprietary standard from Intel. Now, however, Intel states that they intend to release the protocol in the same way as USB, which opens up for AMD, for example, to integrate support for Thunderbolt 3 in both future processors and control circuits for motherboards.

As an advantage for Thunderbolt 3, Intel emphasizes that it is a universal solution for everything from monitor connection to fast external storage. Intel also hopes that the initiative will kick-start the market for external graphics card solutions, where for years there has been talk of using Thunderbolt to make this possible.

The plan is for Intel’s Thunderbolt to be released as an open standard without licensing costs in 2018.