The need of having own company identification for mass production of BLE device

[Tai]

Hi everyone,

We're using the "Manufacturer Specific Data" field within its advertising packets to send the firmware version to a phone application. It requires the company_indentifier field and we're using (0x0059) from Nordic for that field in the meantime.

I'm convincing my boss to register for a company identification, but I haven't given very solid reason for this yet. Reading several posts in the forum for this topic, several things came up like: 

• To legally sell the BLE product, a company identification is needed.
• Cannot ship a Bluetooth product without your own company ID.
• The BT SIG will catch you if you try to work around it. Had a few panic projects where the customer neglected that part and needed our help to figure out what to do to "be legit" after they got a nastygram from the SIG.
• Potential future trouble with clashes without company ID

I do appreciate to hear more about the reason behind of registering a company ID for BLE products which will sell to the market. Thanks, Tai!

[Emil Lenngren]

You don't get a manufacturer id automatically when signing up for Bluetooth SIG membership or when you create a product listing; you can get one if you want one by applying according to these instructions: support.bluetooth.com/.../360062030092-Requesting-Assigned-Numbers. The process is simple and free.

You don't need one to legally sell Bluetooth products. Instead why you would want your own id is, among other things, that you can advertise your custom advertisement data. Each manufacturer defines the format of manufacturer specific data and if you use someone else's id but supply totally different data than in the format they have specified, then apps that scan for Bluetooth devices and try to parse the manufacturer data may not work as intended, or might mix up their devices with your devices.

However, there is nothing what I can see in the Bluetooth member terms or license agreement that would make Bluetooth SIG come after you in case you misuse someone else's manufacturer specific id (please correct me if I'm wrong). It's more about based on trust to not misuse someone else's id in order to have a good quality and reliability of advertisement data for Bluetooth devices on the market.

On the contrary, Bluetooth SIG even states "Bluetooth SIG has no obligation to take any action to prevent or stop any use or misuse of an Assigned Number by any person or entity." in the Bluetooth assigned number agreement.