The concept of inductive charging has been around for a little while now. (The Palm Pre launched with such a feature, and battery manufacturers Duracell and Eveready offer their own inductive chargers to use with various electronic devices.) The goal, of course, is to eliminate extra wires and clutter. So, when the Wall Street Journal recently reported on the new iPhone and mentioned Apple experimenting with “a new way of charging the phone”, this technology immediately came to mind for many readers.
Unfortunately, inductive charging has limitations with the amount of power it can supply to devices and a requirement that a device to be charged sits on some type of mat or charging surface or that it sits close to the power source. A startup company called WiTricity has been aiming to change this, since they were founded in 2007. Their technology, developed at MIT, allows transfer of larger amounts of power than standard induction at distances of up to 2 meters (7 feet). They accomplish this by utilizing the phenomenon that magnetic fields of two devices with closely matched resonant frequencies can couple into a single continuous magnetic field.
Interestingly, a patent application recently surfaced from Apple that references this technology and depicts an Apple iMac acting as the resonant power source for surrounding peripherals including a mouse, keyboard, and even devices such as the iPhone or an iPad.
Of course, many such patents don’t wind up becoming commercial products, so it’s too early to tell whether Apple will really bring this idea to market or not. It is, however, clear that WiTricity’s research is being looked at seriously by a few major players. Intel Corp. recently demoed it, and Toyota invested in the technology as well, entering into a partnership in April to use it for charging their electric cars.
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