Wireless Power Consortium Uses S4 Launch to Push Qi Technology After Samsung Demo

Wireless charging is another piece to add to the lengthy feature set of the Samsung Galaxy S4 that’s due to ship in late April, and the various wireless charging organizations hope their members will reap their share of the promising S4 ecosystem. The Wireless Power Consortium wasted no time following the S4 announcement to promote the fact that Samsung demonstrated at the Samsung Unpacked event its Qi wireless charging platform in backplates and wireless charging pads that will be available as accessories from select providers when the phone ships. Samsung demonstration of Qi is evidence that “Qi is the way to go,” Menno Treffers, chairman of the Wireless Power Consortium, the industry group behind Qi, told us.

Powermat plans to have charging products as well for the S4 using replaceable cases and charging pads through its Duracell Powermat joint venture for the retail market, Daniel Schreiber, Powermat president, told us. The company doesn’t discuss products prior to shipping, he said. Schreiber noted that replaceable backplates from each standard are also available for the Galaxy S III. Qi wireless charging products are primarily available through Verizon stores, according to Treffers. “What Samsung has done to make our lives easier is to remove the backdoor,” Schreiber said. He said generic “Pogo pins,” or touch points, enable the phone’s backdoor to transfer power to the phone from a charging pad.

With Powermat and Qi, inductive charging technologies, charging cases have to line up with the pads they rest on and must be virtually touching. The Alliance for Wireless Power (A4WP) wants to take wireless charging to the next level and give consumers “spatial freedom” by being able to charge multiple devices on a charging pad, regardless of position. The A4WP standard was finalized in January and the first products incorporating the technology will trickle out late this year, with full production expected over 2014, said Geoff Gordon, chairman of the marketing committee for A4WP. Samsung and Qualcomm launched A4WP last May, and the organization has grown to 38 members, Gordon told us. Powermat is a member of A4WP.

Treffers of WPC acknowledges that the charging pad/case model hasn’t been popular with consumers. Nokia’s Qi-enabled Lumia phones along with a Qi-enabled JBL speaker dock designed to work with Lumia phones, can be charged wirelessly without a custom backplate, but most Qi products have relied on the backplate solution.

A4WP’s solution allows for “freedom of movement” and doesn’t require the one-to-one relationship between the charging and receiving coils, Gordon said. The A4WP spec allows for a “charging area,” that could charge three phones simultaneously, using just the amount of power required, Gordon said. There’s also “vertical separation” flexibility of up to 55 millimeters, he said. A phone could charge on top of a notebook placed on top of a desktop charger, he said. Or, “You could screw a charging pad underneath a desk and have an embedded wireless transmitter,” he said. The A4WP spec covers products up to 22 watts, including tablets, he said.

While there has been talk about a universal standard, and Treffers holds out hope for one. The three technologies currently aren’t compatible. Gordon of A4WP declined to comment on whether that could happen down the road.

Samsung didn’t respond to questions about wireless charging by our deadline.