New Industry Products

Wireless Charging RF-to-DC IC Rectifier

October 29, 2015 by Jeff Shepard

Energous Corporation is sampling the world's first RF-to-dc rectifier IC. Called WattUp™ this wire-free charging IC can be integrated to provide charging to a wide variety of electronic devices such as cell phones, tablets, wearables, cameras, wireless keyboards and mice, headsets, sensors, LED lights, remote controls and toys.

A WattUp™ transmitter, or Power Router, sends energy via a radio frequency (RF) signal to your WattUp-enabled electronic devices when requested. A WattUp receiver in each device converts that signal into battery power. The entire system is software controlled, so it's intelligent and customizable to your needs and environment. And, because it's designed to work invisibly in the background, WattUp has the ability to make low battery anxiety a thing of the past.

An RF system, similar to a Wi-Fi system, delivers safe wire-free charging energy at a distance of approximately 15ft from a transmitter to a receiver device, such as a mobile phone, and maintains charging while the receiver is in motion. 12 receiver devices can be managed by the system simultaneously.

Highly-targeted pockets of energy are delivered via multiple miniature antenna arrays and custom control chips in the transmitter, or Power Router. Energy harvesting of the micro energy beams from these pockets then takes place via paired antenna arrays and custom chips in the receiver devices. The WattUpâ„¢ software system ensures that the charging waveforms are dynamically directed, focused and controlled via proprietary algorithms. Charging and communication between transmitters and receivers is intelligently managed using BLE and enterprise-class wireless networking protocols.

"We are very excited to announce that we've begun sampling our new RF receive power chip, the first of its kind to be available," said Stephen R. Rizzone, CEO of Energous. "In just over 18 months, we have moved from discreet components to our 3rd version of silicon. We continue to advance our wire-free charging technology with significant efficiency improvements while decreasing solution size and lowering BOM costs."

As the world's first highly integrated, high efficiency RF integrated circuit for wireless power reception, the new Receiver IC: Supports four independent Rx antenna inputs, allowing for cost-effective scalability from low-power devices like wearables, all the way to higher-power devices such as tablets and smartphones. Leverages Energous' innovative Rx chain technology with the smallest package, enabling the next generation of ultra-small wearable devices to be designed with wire-free charging, which hasn't been possible using pad or mat-based systems. Enables a maximum input power up to 30dBm per port. Supports the 5.8GHz band. Improves system efficiency compared with previous silicon. And further miniaturizes the WattUp receive solution footprint.