The tiny interlocking combs of specialized ink could power human implants, drones and cameras. Each microbattery is thinner than a human hair. Read more »
Apple said the new MacBook has the longest battery life of any of its notebooks. Well, according to the first users, that claim is true. Here’s a roundup of the best Air reviews. Read more »
New Texas Instruments chipsets won’t help your device run longer on a single charge, but they will allow for 30 percent faster recharging. And the Li-Ion battery in your mobile device will last longer over the device lifetime. Read more »
Venture capital-backed lithium ion battery startup Amprius is finally moving into commercial production, with an announcement that it has OEM partners in place, and will start making its second-gen batteries later this year. Read more »
Battery startup Aquion Energy is raising another round of $35 million from Bill Gates and other new and existing investors. The company has been planning to build a factory in Pennsylvania that can produce its low cost power grid batteries. Read more »
A battery accelerator program and San Jose State University will start offering classes on battery technology and business starting this Summer. California has emerged as a leader in battery innovation. Read more »
A startup called Seeo, backed by Vinod Khosla and Google.org, has created a safer lithium ion battery that’s being trialled with a solar panel system developed by SunEdison. Batteries can provide much needed energy storage systems for solar. Read more »
There’s still some venture capital money out there for next-generation lithium ion batteries. Startup Leyden Energy has raised $10 million to continue to commercialize its tech for tablets and start-stop vehicle technology. Read more »
A young battery startup called Imprint Energy has designed a new type of battery that uses zinc and can be screen printed. It’s innovation could enable entirely new types of wearable electronics. Read more »
Boom — the numbers for cleantech VC investing in 2012 are out and they ain’t pretty. A cleantech cliff of sorts has arrived and represents an end of an era. If you still want to be in the space in 2013, here’s 5 things you should avoid. Read more »
If approved, the future of A123 System’s lithium ion battery tech will fittingly be owned by Chinese auto giant Wanxiang. China is increasingly becoming one of the most important markets for electric vehicles in the world. Read more »
What happened in cleantech on GigaOM Pro?: a hot new report on next-gen battery innovations, a column on why design matters for cleantech, and much more. Read more »
Two battery startups join forces on the long road of next-generation battery manufacturing. Contour Energy Systems, which makes fluorine-based batteries, has acquired Actacell and its lithium ion battery material tech. ActaCell will operate as a subsidiary under Contour Energy Systems. Read more »
Batteries fall pathetically short of our customary fossil fuel energy storage medium. When we wake up to a declining global availability of petroleum, we won’t just switch over to electric cars. Read more »
The U.S. government continues to give small grants to early stage next-generation battery technology in an effort to boost innovation in the U.S., and provide energy storage for electric cars and the power grid. Read more »
There are only a little over 500 deployed energy storage projects in the world, according to Pike Research. So what’s the hold up? Here’s three hurdles facing energy storage grid projects. Read more »
IBM has made a lot of noise about its lithium air battery, which it says can hold as much energy in a given volume as gasoline can. But General Motors isn’t all that convinced that lithium air battery technology is worth the investment. Read more »
If battery makers could enhance just the basic electrolyte — the guts of the battery — it could provide a major breakthrough for batteries. That’s what a year-and-a-half-old startup called Boulder Ionics is trying to do. Read more »
How many of us have gone through numerous batteries for our laptops, because aging batteries start to lose their ability to charge? Yep, me too. Stanford’s materials scientist Yi Cui is working on a lithium ion battery that could last six times longer. Read more »
Materials giant 3M has a new battery innovation that could deliver gadgets that could run for 40 percent longer without being charged, or could be significantly smaller with standard battery life. Read more »
MIT Professor Donald Sadoway’s lectures were good enough to convince Bill Gates to invest in his startup called Liquid Metal Battery. Now you can watch a glimpse of a mini lecture by Sadoway, because the TED conference just released his TED talk. It’s worth a watch! Read more »
Here’s what you need to know about flow batteries: how they work, what innovation is happening in the market, who buys these batteries, and what are the benefits? Read more »
Your LTE phone is just as adept at eating battery power as it is at eating bandwidth. Last week, I wrote about the many ways that LTE devices are far more power hungry than their 3G predecessors. Now let’s look at what’s being doing about it. Read more »
LTE phones are the fastest things on the airwaves, but they can also suck a battery dry in a few hours. Here are five reasons why your new Samsung Galaxy Nexus or HTC Vivid is going dead right after lunch time. Read more »
While some day in the future we could all have our own personal home battery systems combined with solar panels, Japanese home owners could get these goodies sooner, rather than later. Read more »
Although it’s still winter, now is the time to do some spring cleaning on your Mac to help it run more efficient and reliably. Here are six simple steps to take that will get your Mac sparkly clean and running like new. Read more »
Innergie just launched its PocketCell portable battery, and sent me a review unit for use at CES. The portable battery and cable system has already saved my hide here at the show and I’ll be buying my own as soon as I get back home. Read more »
I just took delivery of Samsung’s $40 spare battery charging station for my Galaxy Nexus. The second battery will give me peace of mind in case I run through my first one, but the included dock, or stand, is mediocre at best: take a close look. Read more »
Shopping time is almost up for this year’s holiday season, but shipping deadlines have yet to elapse completely, and stores will still be plenty busy. In this week’s installment of our series, we’re looking at power accessories for Apple devices that could make great last-minute gifts. Read more »
There are hundreds of startups, massive battery conglomerates and university labs that are trying to push the battery envelope and create as much power at the lowest cost for these little energy storage devices. Here’s some details from my GigaOM Pro report. Read more »
If there is one thing to know about the pace of progress for battery innovation, it’s this: There is no Moore’s law for batteries. The rapid progress that has been made over the past decade in silicon and computing makes the pace of innovation in batteries, ... Read more at GigaOM Pro »
Mobile device owners in New York City have 50 bar locations to freely charge their smartphones, thanks to a deal between Patrón Sprits and goCharge, which makes device-charging kiosks. Batteries can be topped off in 10 minutes: just enough time for some cheesy pickup lines. Read more »
A lack of progress for battery technology is (arguably) the single biggest barrier for gadgets, electric vehicles, and the power grid. But there’s hundreds of researchers, entrepreneurs, universities and large companies working on battery breakthroughs. Here’s 25 you should know about: Read more »
Batteries continue to be the bane of mobile devices, but research done at Northwestern University could change that, with longer-lasting batteries that charge in minutes, not hours. Imagine a battery that lasts 10 times longer than today’s power packs with a 15-minute recharge time! Read more »
Apple over the weekend sent out a notice to registered first-generation iPod nano owners detailing a recall for the product, due to battery issues that could cause some units to become excessively hot. Here’s a detailed guide for getting your replacement, and why you’d want to. Read more »
Apple had previously released iOS 5.0.1 to developers for beta testing, but as of Tuesday, a report claims it is now extending that testing pool to include some ordinary end users, too. 9t05Mac received an invitation to download the pre-release software through Apple’s software seed program. Read more »
Apple said in a short statement Wednesday to AllThingsD that it has found iOS 5 bugs responsible for battery issues experienced by many iPhone 4S (and other device) owners, and will issue “a software update to address those [bugs] in a few weeks.” Read more »
Sometimes you need a plain old phone more than you need a smartphone. But with all the activities and apps you have running on your iPhone, your battery may not hold out when you need it most. Here’s how to help make sure it does. Read more »
Amidst the stock slump that lithium ion battery maker A123 System’s is facing, the company touts a new production contract with GM. Read more »
Android cell phones are notoriously bad at battery drain. But recently I discovered the single app that has smartly and simply solved many of these battery life problems for me: the PowerMax Android app made by Volt-Up. Read more »
