History, Current Status and Future of the Wireless Power Consortium and the Qi Interface Specification

In November 2008, eight companies founded an open industry group, the Wireless Power Consortium, because these companies concluded that wireless charging solutions for mobile phones could not be introduced successfully unless wireless chargers were compatible across brands. By jointly developing a wireless power interface specification,the members of the Wireless Power Consortium share the risks and the investments needed to create a market for their products. At the same time, the members of the Wireless Power Consortium compete with each other in the market. They compete for market share by providing implementations of the standard that have unique properties. The competition between the members makes sure that performance increases, cost go down, and that more applications are served with solutions tuned to specific market needs. The Wireless Power Consortium published the Qi interface specification in August 2010, together with a test specification and a certification procedure. More than 200 companies are now a members of the Wireless Power Consortium, and more than 700 different products have been certified to be compliant with the Qi interface specification. In the coming years the Wireless Power Consortium will extend the Qi interface specification by providing more choice in power levels, more choice in transfer distance, more choice in charging area, more choice in low-cost solutions, more choice in multidevice chargers, more choice in systems for automotive use, and more choice in systems for public space charging.