uBeam developing "Wi-Fi for energy" to enable wireless charging

The day when we don't have to plug in our consumer electronics is getting closer, thanks to a new startup named uBeam that has developed a safe way of beaming power to your devices.

Rather than using inductive charging, which has a very short effective range and usually requires that the charger and device be in close proximity to each other, uBeam uses an ultrasonic transducer to convert power from your wall socket into inaudible sound energy. On the device side, there's a battery adapter that converts the sound energy back into power to charge your batteries. The ultrasonic frequency used is well above the range that can be heard by humans or dogs.

uBeam wants to develop wireless charging units for home and commercial use, with the idea that businesses like Starbucks could install a transducer on the ceiling of each coffee shop to provide power to gadget-happy customers who have a uBeam battery adapter.

The product idea was developed by two recent University of Pennsylvania graduates, and they demoed a proof of concept device made from off-the-shelf parts for Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher at the D9 conference. Check out the video below for more information about the technology and the plans uBeam has for making your future even more wireless.

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Source: http://allthingsd.com/20110618/how-to-charge-your-iphone-ove…

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uBeam wants to develop wireless charging units for home and commercial use

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JC Roberts

to everyone who wants to just put this down and say how crappy it will be? good for you, you can carry your chargers everywhere you go. for everyone else in the world who wants to go wireless charging. Hell yeah.(quit hating)

November 14 2011 at 2:14 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

ruffi

This technology has already been invented. Why don't you do some Nikola Tesla research.

June 21 2011 at 1:53 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Barnaby Waloop

Christ, who's that woman who looks like that one out of Scooby Doo, she's so annoying and unnecessary. Why is there so much Yaking too, too much useless talk, it should have been rehearsed better, very amateurish and irritating.

June 20 2011 at 11:52 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Chad Harrelson

Too bad a company developed this in 1987. The name of the product? The B.E.T. - Broadcast Energy Transmitter. The group that invented it? G.I. Joe.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093066/

June 20 2011 at 7:00 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

hfwbr

This insanely inefficient scheme will never make it out of the gate.

June 20 2011 at 6:29 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Matt Jones

Good luck with this - the relevant OSHA rules limit even sound at 100 kHz-ish to a maximum intensity of 115dB. Even assuming perfect efficiency in the receiver, perfect beamforming, *and* no material obstructions you're looking at roughly 0.3W at the output end. For comparison, a vanilla USB port (not the high-power ones) provides 2W...

June 20 2011 at 5:41 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

brijazz

Nice :) Have one of the "sources" in your home, your car and your place of business, and your gadgets will perpetually be charged.

June 20 2011 at 4:03 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Corby Ziesman

Fundamentally, this looks extremely wasteful. Only part of the emitted energy is absorbed, the rest just fans out and reaches nothing. Adding this to coffee shops or any other place where it'd just be always on is just wasting massive amounts of energy.

June 20 2011 at 4:03 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply