Menno Treffers, chairman of the Wireless Power Consortium, tells CNBC’s Bernard Lo more about the Qi Standard.
Wireless Power Consortium
Setting the international standard for interoperable wireless charging
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CNBC-Asia about QiSeptember 3rd, 2010Qi specification available for downloadAugust 31st, 2010The Qi interface specification, formally called System Description is available for download by the general public at http://www.wirelesspowerconsortium.com/downloads/wireless-power-specification-part-1.html Certification service is operationalAugust 3rd, 2010The Qi product certification service is now operational. This was the last piece of our puzzle. It is now possible to develop and sell products with the Qi logo. Products must be certified by an independent test lab before they are allowed to carry the Qi logo. When you see the Qi logo on on a product you know: this works with other Qi products, independent of the manufacturer, the product’s brand, or the country where you bought the product. Testing by an independent test lab helps to make sure that the Qi logo delivers on that promise. Everything is now in place: interface specification, test documentation, logo licenses, and finally the certification service. A standard is not enoughJuly 25th, 2010The Qi standard is a document that describes how to design power transmitters and power receivers. It is a rather complicated text, more abstract than your typical product design documentation. It is more abstract because an interoperability standard tries to maximize the design freedom for product developers. Not everything is fixed and that can make it difficult to understand. Our goal is interoperability. A power receiver must work with all power transmitters. Interoperability follows automatically when the product developer follows the instructions in the standard. Right? Well, … that is the theory. In practice it does not work like that. Even a properly reviewed specification can be ambigeous. Product developers can interpret a text in ways the editor never considered. And product developers can make mistakes. The result is a product that might not work with other products. Publishing the documentation of a standard is not enough. To achieve our goal we also need:
The test procedures must cover all aspects of the standard. Everything that could possibly go wrong must be verified. It is interesting to note that, for standards like Qi, the documentation of the test procedures has more pages than the standard itself! Our customers will see the Qi logo and know: this product works with my other Qi products. That promise holds if the logo is used on properly tested products. No Qi logo on products that don’t work! To protect Qi’s promise, the logo is trademarked and you need a license to use the logo. That license makes the use of the logo dependent on certification by an independent test lab. Publishing a standard is not enough. Without test documentation, certification services, and a logo license agreement, interoperability is an illusion. Qi low-power standard is readyJuly 24th, 2010The Qi low power standard is ready. This standard delivers up to 5 Watt into wireless power receivers. The technical specification will become available on August 30 as free download for everyone. I am now looking forward to see the first products with the Qi logo. The logo license program is ready too, as well as product certification services. The specification work group has developed a test specification. This test spec is used to determine whether a product is compliant or not. Only products that work according to the specifications carry the Qi logo. Before a product gets the logo an independent test lab must perform the compliance tests. These certification service will start in the beginning of August. Yes, Qi is ready! The psychology of connectorsNovember 24th, 2009Sometimes a new technology changes our behavior. Has wireless power technology that potential? It doesn’t seem to matter much whether you plug in the power cable or place the phone on a charging pad. Let’s do a psychological experiment to find out. Take your phone, connect the power cable, and place the phone on your desk. Do you feel any hesitation to pick up the phone to make a call? What happens when the phone rings? Do you feel annoyed that you have to unplug the phone? I do. It is a subtle effect, but it influences how I charge my phone. I tend to delay charging until the battery runs low or until I know that I won’t be using my phone for a while. Connector-free charging changes that behavior. When people don’t feel reluctant they will charge more often and for shorter periods. And that will improve the user experience of high-performance, power-hungry, smart-phones. Network externalityOctober 4th, 2009Wireless power is adopted easily in some applications. Toothbrushes, for example, and in UV lamps for water desinfection. But penetration in offices and living rooms is limited today, even though consumer tests show that users like wireless power very much. The problem with wireless power in offices and living rooms is that the perceived value increases with the number of different products that can be charged wirelessly. In other words, only few consumers are prepared to pay US$ 50 for a dedicated charger. That perception changes when a wireless charger services many products. In economics this effect is called a ‘network externality‘. Products with a strong network externality benefit from co-operation between companies. Consumers see more value when many companies introduce products that work together. That’s why companies work together on the standardization of wireless power. They all benefit from increased sales. Products with strong a network externality are hard to introduce in the market. On the other hand, once successful, the interface tends to stay around. New products benefit from interoperability with the installed base, and the perceived value of alternative solutions remains low. When network externalities are strong it is, therefore, risky to invest in products that don’t work with the established standard. It can be surprisingly expensive to go against the flow. Power through the air?September 12th, 2009It is not difficult to transmit power through the air. Tesla famously demoed it in 1891, using magnetic induction technology. NASA demoed long distance transport with microwaves. And don’t forget solar power. That is wireless too! It is pretty obvious why we are not using microwaves to transmit power through the air at home. But why did Tesla’s technology never make it into our homes? There is a fundamental problem with magnetic induction – the efficiency drops dramatically if the distance through the air is larger than the coil diameter. There are also a couple of practical problems. Getting low standby power is one of those practical issues. The fundamental efficiency limitation can be seen in the somewhat complicated figure 2 in this article on the transfer efficiency of magnetic induction. What it boils down to is simple:
Look carefully at the distance between the two coils when you see a demo of power transfer through the air. Here is a recent demo by Intel. And another one by WiTricity. The distance between the coils is about the same as the diameter of the coils. That’s not a coincidence. The demo would not work if you move the coils further apart! This means that, if you want to charge your mobile phone with reasonable efficiency, the phone cannot be more than 5-10 centimeter away from the transmitter. That is not enough to be useful in practice. The practical issue of low standby power is another reason why ‘power through the air’ does not take off. This is the problem: how can the power transmitter know that your phone needs charging? Your phone’s battery is empty – it is dead and not talking to the transmitter. The only way for the transmitter to know about your phone is to be ‘always on’ and searching for resonating coils in its surroundings. This search need not cost enormous amounts of energy, but it is significantly more than the standby power of a classic wired power adapter. And I have not even discussed issues with the biological impact on the users. Here is a pointer to information about meeting regulatory EMF limitations. (These regulations limit human exposure to alternating magnetic fields). For me, the right method to transport power trough the air is with sunlight and wind. Sunlight works great if the solar panel is large enough. But when you integrate the panel in the phone you get 5 minutes talk time for each hour of charging. That is not practical, unfortunately. I would prefer to get 60 minutes talk time with 5 minutes charging. And my phone is usually in my pocket. Not baking in the sun. Speed or consensus?September 3rd, 2009It usually takes a lot of time for an SDO (Standard Development Organization) to make a standard. Organizations like ISO and IEC aim to create consensus. That is logical, and necessary, because standards need broad support to become successful. Consensus costs time. Getting a standard developed by an SDO, and approved, typically takes many years. Suppose you have a great product idea and need to agree an interface with products from other companies. What do you do? Go to IEC or bring the relevant companies together in an industry consortium? It depends on the type of standard, obviously. But an industry consortium works well for the wireless power interface. Decision can be made quickly provided (a) the consortium has agreed goals and clear requirements, and (b) the number of voting members in the consortium remains small. The maximum number of voting members is a delicate balance between the need to involve different stakeholders and the need for speed. Eight to ten voting members works well in my experience. With the right group of companies that will get you a standard within a year. The finished result can then be offered to IEC or another appropriate SDO for fast track formal approval. An industry consortium is fast, predictable, and costs less. Niche or mass market?August 28th, 2009UV lamps for water purification, toothbrushes…. The most successful applications of wireless power have special requirements and relatively low volume. These are niche applications. What is holding back the application in mass market products like mobile phones? The answer lies in the balance between cost and the perceived value of the transmitter. Would you pay $50 for a wireless charging pad? Ok, you might. But not many people would. They are not used to pay that much extra for a cradle, or for a power adapter. The proposition changes when we lower the cost and increase the perceived value. The Qi logo increases the perceived value. The logo tells the consumer: this product can be used with many other products. I am not buying a charger for this one phone, but it can also use it for my remote control, and for next year’s phone. This risk is much reduced: higher perceived value. Cost must also be reduced. It must be feasible to bundle the power transmitter with a mobile device. At $50 per charger that won’t happen. The standard specification makes it possible. We enable the option to create simple low-cost transmitters. Standardization opens up the mass market, and takes wireless power technology out of its niche. |
