Episode 405: More CES trends including wireless power

Episode 405: More CES trends including wireless power

Author: Stacey Higginbotham, tech journalist January 12, 2023 Duration: 1:00:37

Want to bring an IoT company back from the dead? Or understand the technical and business challenges associated with building an IoT product? Then this story by Kevin Chung is for you. Kevin and I  have left CES 2023 behind, but we had plenty of of things to talk about on this week’s show, starting with our sense of disappointment after the show. We also serve up some more news from CES tied to Matter, Leviton, Aqara, and new products from Shelly. Then we discuss the deal between John Deere and The American Farm Bureau Federation to give U.S. farmers the tools they need to repair their own farming equipment at fair and reasonable rates. We talk about what this deal does and does not make possible. We also focus on wireless power with news from Energous, Ossia and a door lock that we saw at CES that charges over the air. I can’t wait to get rid of charging cables, and batteries. We then answer a listener question about updating plugs and energy monitoring products to Matter.

The Aqara presence sensor will come out later this year and cost $60. Image is a screenshot from Aqara’s YouTube.

Our guest this week is Sanjay Gupta, president of the AirFuel Alliance. He’s on the show talking about the newly launched AirFuel RF standard, which provides up to 1 watt of power over a distance. We discuss what that means for convenience in terms of not having to replace batteries, and what it means for sustainability if we can eliminate batteries. We also talk about why over-the-air wireless power is actually real after more than a decade of hearing about it. It turns out we have companies such as Wiliot, Atmosic and others who are pioneering efficient computing and low power radios for IoT use cases to thank. Finally, we discuss when we’re likely to see wireless power become commonplace and where we’ll see it first. Enjoy the show.

Hosts: Stacey Higginbotham and Kevin Tofel
Guest: Sanjay Gupta, president of the AirFuel Alliance
Sponsor: Silicon Labs

  • What’s next for the Matter standard
  • Why this Aqara sensor is so cool
  • John Deere compromises on right to repair
  • Over-the-air wireless charging is ready for its close up
  • Low power chips help bring over-the-air wireless power closer

The post Episode 405: More CES trends including wireless power appeared first on IoT Podcast - Internet of Things.


For anyone trying to make sense of a world where everything from your thermostat to a factory floor is getting smarter, The Internet of Things Podcast-Stacey On IoT offers essential context. Veteran tech journalist Stacey Higginbotham, who brings her experience from Fortune, and co-host Kevin Tofel break down the weekly flood of news, separating genuine innovation from mere hype. Their analysis spans the entire connected ecosystem, diving into the gadgets in our homes, the sensors transforming industrial workspaces, and the complex enterprise systems tying it all together. This isn't just theoretical; it's a practical guide to the business and technology decisions shaping our networked future. You'll hear from a range of voices that have built and critiqued this landscape, including pioneers like Vint Cerf, insightful commentators like Om Malik, and practitioners from companies such as Amazon, AT&T, and IBM Watson. Listening to this podcast provides a crucial framework for understanding the real-world implications of connectivity, whether you're an industry professional, a curious developer, or simply someone wondering how all these "smart" things actually work-and what they mean for privacy, security, and daily life. It's the clear-eyed conversation you need to navigate the ever-expanding Internet of Things.
Author: Language: en-us Episodes: 100

The Internet of Things Podcast - Stacey On IoT
Podcast Episodes
Episode 407: Does the IoT mean the end of privacy? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:02:41
This week’s show kicks off with a discussion about Carnegie Mellon’s research into detecting people’s movements through walls using Wi-Fi. As part of the discussion we also talk about the use of stick figures to protect…
Episode 406: Return of the HomePod [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

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This week’s show kicks off with a discussion of Apple’s new HomePod, which has some cool machine learning capabilities and new sensors built into it, plus a higher price tag than most smart speakers. Then we talk about a…
Episode 404: CES has more Matter and many voices [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 57:55
Kevin and I are at CES 2023 this week and eager for the show floor to open to see all of the new and crazy gear. But before we see the show floor, we had to slog through the planned news and media events, which we’re tal…
Episode 403: Matter upgrades aren’t ready for prime time [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:03:03
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Episode 402: Google begins its Matter roll out [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:01:29
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Episode 401: Two big smart home deals explained [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 54:24
The end of the year is a busy time for M&A as companies rush to get deals done before the start of a new tax year, and this week the smart home sector saw Assa Abloy sell its Yale and August smart lock and some other bra…
Episode 400: How to pronounce IKEA’s Dirigera hub [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:06:35
This week’s show starts off with a review of news from AWS Re:Invent which is happening now in LAs Vegas. We cover the general availability of support for the latest version of the MQTT messaging protocol, the launch of…
Episode 399: Alexa’s drama and our holiday gift guide [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:01:39
The biggest news in the internet of things this week was the staggering story about Amazon’s Alexa business being responsible for the majority of an estimated $10 billion loss in the year ahead. So Kevin and I discuss wh…
Episode 398: Bluetooth bets on 6 GHz and TP-Link hops on Wi-Fi 7 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 56:54
Amazon has started laying off workers, including some working on Alexa and in Amazon’s devices business. We discuss this as well as IBM following in Google’s footsteps and shutting down its IoT cloud business. We move fr…
Episode 397: Arduino Opta adds a little IT to the OT [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 58:29
This week’s show kicks off with a discussion of the lawsuit between Arm and Qualcomm amid accusations that Arm is changing its licensing model. We cover what has been said, and what it might mean for the IoT before headi…