Opinionated comments on mobile phone industry news
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All entries are written by Anders Borg, CEO and Consultant of Abiro, that has a long experience in strategic planning, developing embedded and Java software, usability aspects, and the mobile phone industry in general. You can also read the latest Mobile News entries on your phone via wap.abiro.com, and we provide many News Feeds from popular news services. For advertising and contribution queries, please use the feedback form. News feed (local) FeedBurner Feed
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Thursday, January 11, 2007
The other aspect of wireless: Wireless power
The problem with wireless devices is that if they should run for a longer time they either need to be connected to a wall socket, which kind of takes away the main benefit of the device being wireless in the first place, or you have to charge a battery in the device.
As Nancy Gohring experiences in 'Wireless power' could save the day, if also power could be transferred wirelessly you at least would not have to bring along device-specific power supplies to all the different devices you have. Charging from a distance is still a pipe dream.
Of course there could have been strict regulations for how mobile devices should be charged via a cable (one connector type, one voltage etc), e.g. by always using USB, and that would not involve any patent issues, but an alternative is to adopt Fulton's wireless/magnetic transfer of energy, so that any kind of mobile device could be easily charged by just bringing along one type of charger. Also, hotels etc could place such chargers in the rooms.
I mentioned patents before, and I guess that's the issue with Fulton's approach: The plethora of patents probably makes this into a "either accept using Fulton's technology only, or probably not wireless power at all" scenario. Pick your poison. I'm amazed such a core technology can be protected by close to 200 patents.
As Nancy Gohring experiences in 'Wireless power' could save the day, if also power could be transferred wirelessly you at least would not have to bring along device-specific power supplies to all the different devices you have. Charging from a distance is still a pipe dream.
Of course there could have been strict regulations for how mobile devices should be charged via a cable (one connector type, one voltage etc), e.g. by always using USB, and that would not involve any patent issues, but an alternative is to adopt Fulton's wireless/magnetic transfer of energy, so that any kind of mobile device could be easily charged by just bringing along one type of charger. Also, hotels etc could place such chargers in the rooms.
I mentioned patents before, and I guess that's the issue with Fulton's approach: The plethora of patents probably makes this into a "either accept using Fulton's technology only, or probably not wireless power at all" scenario. Pick your poison. I'm amazed such a core technology can be protected by close to 200 patents.
