Wireless charging is an unexpectedly rich source of innovation, with no fewer than three organizations seeking to set the default standard for cable-free mobile devices, and Qualcomm now targeting electric cars. This race will support a range of clever start-ups, for a while at least, and one is Ossia, which has showed off a wireless power system that can work over distances up to 30 feet without line of sight.
The technology, Cota, can deliver targeted energy to multiple devices throughout an average two-storey home, said its inventor. It will work with handsets and other devices such as cameras, games consoles and remote controls.
The firm’s patented smart antenna technology uses phased arrays to transfer power, rather than using one of the main existing approaches to wireless charging, all of which demand contact or very close proximity to a pad or mat. They include induction charging, as in the Qi standard, which requires close contact; magnetic resonance, which is suited to higher demand applications like cars, but is still immature; as well as ultrasonic waves, and charging pads or mats.
Instead, Ossia claims to be changing the thinking on wireless charging with its smart antennas. Its technology is incorporated in a transmitter, which automatically locates Cota receivers built into devices or batteries, and delivers signals to them continuously, even if they are being moved around.
Ossia hopes to encourage consumer electronics manufacturers to include the receivers in new products or retrofit them in older ones, while it will brand the chargers itself under the Cota name. It will also license the hardware or the patents to OEMs. It has raised $3.2m to develop its platform in stealth mode.
‘We have been developing the Cota technology in stealth for the last six years,’ CEO and inventor Hatem Zeine told journalists. ‘By revealing for the very first time real wireless power that is remote, efficient and safe, Ossia expects to change everything you think you know about wireless power.’
Unwrapping the technology for the first time at the Disrupt conference, he said: ‘What we’re doing uses the same frequencies as Wi-Fi. The nice thing about this frequency is that it’s just the sweet spot for our technology for distance, safety, for the size of the antennas and the hardware that we use, it’s just a perfect level. Also it’s well understood, since people have had Wi-Fi in their homes for a long time now.’