“Wireless” recharging has been in development for a while – last year at CES we were impressed with WildCharge who were showing a concept product.

New kid on the block Powermat is also looking impressive. Powermat claim their product is superior because it doesn’t need metal to metal contact so the recharging surface can be embedded within desks, kitchen worktops, walls etc.

Powermat is also unique in that it can handle the high power loads demanded by things like laptops, TV’s and kitchen blenders.

Look for the technology in the shops Q3/Q4 this year. You’ll be able to buy the mat and a series of adapters and sleeves to enable existing devices.

If nothing else, the idea of dumping the plethora of different chargers we currently lug around to enable our digital life and replacing them with a single mat and a few adapters is appealing. It looks good but the real fun will start when one of these companies (and there are a couple of players in the market) manages to persuade a device manufacturer to embed it. If we see a standard emerge it will really take off.