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FWIW I've been following this story for a long time and here is what I think the situation is. Early on the uBeam folks built a pretty low power acoustic trans

by harryh 11y ago

FWIW I've been following this story for a long time and here is what I think the situation is. Early on the uBeam folks built a pretty low power acoustic transmitter/receiver that could, over a relatively short distance, actually deliver a charge to a phone. Not a super useful charge but, you know, something. Based on this demo and some handwaving (and maybe a bit of math) they went out and said "something that delivers more charge is possible. give us some money and time and we'll work out the engineering." Mostly they raised money on this. Likely without a ton of due diligence. The actual engineers working on the project (including the one in this "spat") at some point realize the actual limitations of what is possible physics wise. But they still think "a useful product is possible here." Maybe you can deliver enough to charge a phone overnight while it sits on your coffee table. That could actually be cool? Maybe? Meanwhile the PR machine gets going and, as so often happens, the exaggeration kicks in. Those that haven't been here themselves look at it and see LIES. I have a more nuanced view. The press can misunderstand and distort things on their own side. And then if you don't refute it fast enough then you almost have to support it. Not saying this is ok, but I can see how it happens. The statements about what is possible just get out of hand and then you're stuck with them. So behind the scenes some of the engineers read the press and go "WTF, this is insane, I'm out!" Others say "well, that's all bullshit, but this overnight charger thing could be useful. So I'm gonna keep my head down and work on that. If we can get it to the point that we can release a commercial product then we'll see what the actual market is." Inevitably actually building a commercial product takes longer than you think. These are just normal engineering delays. No "trying to defy physics" type delays. Which brings us to the present day. Almost certainly what has been hyped is not real. But there might be something less good there. Maybe. If they can balance the tradeoffs between input power, actual power delivered, distance and safety. That's real engineering work right there. All just speculation. Take it for whatever it's worth.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
gundar 11y ago
But you can take even normal audio and blast it loud enough to generate some trivial power in a receiving microphone. Phased-array/beam-searing is known technology. You can google and see that she was doing the PR circuit and making some grandiose statements herself. You can't just tackle a hard problem, take in lots of money, produce nothing and say "oops, technology is hard". And shouldn't they have " realize[ed] the actual limitations of what is possible physics wise" before they took the money and started the engineering? Getting 90% of the way to the finish line, but getting beaten there by a competitor is a normal business failure. Getting 0% of the way there, but putting out lots of PR is a con job.
logicallee 11y ago
>The actual engineers working on the project (including the one in this "spat") at some point realize the actual limitations of what is possible physics wise. I read until here and would like to cut you off. So, at this point, can you tell me YOUR perspective on the alternate history where the company, exactly at this point, starts behaving exactly like Apple, consumer-driven instead of fundamental R&D driven, and simply pivots and enters some totally unrelated part of the power or battery market. Literally any other part of it - not just super capacitors (which were making the rounds around that time) but literally ANY part of the market, since they had obscene gobs of money in the bank for the stage they were at ($10M+) and lots of extremely talented engineers. What would have happened? Could they have retained their goodwill, credibility, and name, and simply successfully pivoted?
- manigandham 10y ago
  If they were that rational, they wouldn't have started the original project in the first place.
- logicallee 11y ago
  -4 for asking? Well, okay. I wrote to them when it became obvious that they were selling snake oil, urging them to pivot to tech that can work. I'm curious if people think they could have pivoted, or if they were married to the snake oil (ie a pivot would have failed) . It's a yes/no question without preconception from me and I'd appreciate a response or explanation...
  - ChuckMcM 11y ago
    I think its a valid question on pivots, but its also pretty much the sole discretion of the founder/CEO to actually do the pivot. Without them on board and leading the change you end up with a mess, some people following the "strong" leaders and some people following the "original" leaders, and nobody gets anything done to their satisfaction. It also affects your team makeup, since at the small scale one tries to craft a team with overlapping but interlocking skill sets. Pivots require restructuring for that reason, and being able to pull that off is a skill as well. At the end of the day, if the CEO is thinking the "least risk / best shot" is to stay the course, then a pivot is off the table until you replace the CEO.
harryh 11y ago
Also, maybe they think that even if they can't get a product to market their patents will end up having value down the road. I'm less confident in this guess though as valuing patents in this area is well out of my area of expertise.
Animats 11y ago
Reminds me of Moller and his flying car.[1] Moller has been announcing a flying car Real Soon Now since 1974.[2] It still doesn't work, although he's spent lots of money over four decades, and been in trouble with the SEC. This may be a record for the longest running scam. It's outlived Madoff and the Keely Motor. Technically, the problem is that Moller is trying to do it with Wankel engines, rather than jet turbines. He has some very high power to weight Wankel engines, and at least briefly, he's been able to get the thing a few meters off the ground. But the Wankels can't maintain that power level for long. Jet turbines can, but they cost too much. (Want a hard problem to work on? Build a small, cheap, reliable jet engine. Many people have tried. Willams got the furthest.[3] The general result is that, below 6-passenger bizjet size, smaller jet engines don't get much cheaper. Small jet engines have been built, but the price doesn't come down much if you want the reliability and life of an aircraft engine.) [1] http://www.moller.com http://www.moller.com [2] http://www.downside.com/scams/moller/ http://www.downside.com/scams/moller/ [3] http://www.williams-int.com/ http://www.williams-int.com/
- regularfry 10y ago
  The challenge is [small, cheap, reliable, not deafeningly loud, possible to hook an axle to]. Pulse jets win at the first three, and utterly fail at the last two.
  - wycx 10y ago
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKHz7wOjb9w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKHz7wOjb9w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsXWspo5hrc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsXWspo5hrc Perhaps you could say that hooking an axle to a pulsejet is impractical, rather than impossible.
- tzm 10y ago
  Or 36 tiny ducted electric fan motors.. http://www.bbc.com/autos/story/20160512-the-flying-machine-in-your-back-garden http://www.bbc.com/autos/story/20160512-the-flying-machine-i...
rasz_pl 11y ago
Thats weird, because actual real engineers realized what is possible, and what would be the result of trying to deliver the lie BEFORE company managed to scam first $20mil. In case you are wondering this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YI3NoBeNwfk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YI3NoBeNwfk is the likely outcome of trying to charge couple of phones at the same time in enclosed space the size of starbucks (actual pitch at some point) with this technology.
- harryh 10y ago
  Managed to scam 20 million out of who? Mark Suster doesn't sound like he feels scammed and his fund has put in as much money as anyone.
  - osullivj 10y ago
    Mark Suster has invested a lot of his own money, and his investors, in uBeam. So of course he'll talk it up. No way will be ever do or say anything that will harm the value of his own investment. We call it "talking your own book".
danmaz74 11y ago
> The actual engineers working on the project (including the one in this "spat") at some point realize the actual limitations of what is possible physics wise From reading the blog of their former VP of engineering [0] I got the impression that the actual engineers were aware from the start of the limitations of what was physically possible. Instead, said engineer seems to have only realized with time something else: that the founder and CEO was perfectly at ease with making unrealistic promises to raise truckloads of funding at valuations that were impossible to justify with the performances he (and the other engineers) knew were physically possible. [0] http://liesandstartuppr.blogspot.com/ http://liesandstartuppr.blogspot.com/
- tluyben2 10y ago
  When the company came out in public, there were enough physics people who said that anyone with knowledge of physics can discredit this on the back of a beermat. And a lot of them did (search Ubeam hoax etc). The due diligence on the part of the investors is shocking as they were clearly told (as was advertised everywhere when they got their millions) that this would charge your phone at quite a distance (you sitting/walking in a room and having your phone charging while doing that).
_pmf_ 10y ago
> The actual engineers working on the project (including the one in this "spat") at some point realize the actual limitations of what is possible physics wise Assuming they finished high school, that point would be the first day on their job.
skbohra123 10y ago
its 100% possible to transfer the energy(electricity) from one ) Place to other, For that we have to think the same something differently, Example1: We can transfer the energy by wind media(Wind Energy). We can transfer the light energy as well (like Solar). What i thing by this the efficiency of the system is very low, but we can't say that this is not possible.
jasonlaramburu 10y ago
Every year there are companies in SV that raise Tens of millions of dollars without any public prototype, and many fold before they release their product. Most of the time, such failures are not newsworthy. Why is this case so polarizing?

by harryh 11y ago

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

gundar 11y ago

But you can take even normal audio and blast it loud enough to generate some trivial power in a receiving microphone. Phased-array/beam-searing is known technology. You can google and see that she was doing the PR circuit and making some grandiose statements herself. You can't just tackle a hard problem, take in lots of money, produce nothing and say "oops, technology is hard". And shouldn't they have " realize[ed] the actual limitations of what is possible physics wise" before they took the money and started the engineering? Getting 90% of the way to the finish line, but getting beaten there by a competitor is a normal business failure. Getting 0% of the way there, but putting out lots of PR is a con job.

logicallee 11y ago

>The actual engineers working on the project (including the one in this "spat") at some point realize the actual limitations of what is possible physics wise. I read until here and would like to cut you off. So, at this point, can you tell me YOUR perspective on the alternate history where the company, exactly at this point, starts behaving exactly like Apple, consumer-driven instead of fundamental R&D driven, and simply pivots and enters some totally unrelated part of the power or battery market. Literally any other part of it - not just super capacitors (which were making the rounds around that time) but literally ANY part of the market, since they had obscene gobs of money in the bank for the stage they were at ($10M+) and lots of extremely talented engineers. What would have happened? Could they have retained their goodwill, credibility, and name, and simply successfully pivoted?

manigandham 10y ago
If they were that rational, they wouldn't have started the original project in the first place.
logicallee 11y ago
-4 for asking? Well, okay. I wrote to them when it became obvious that they were selling snake oil, urging them to pivot to tech that can work. I'm curious if people think they could have pivoted, or if they were married to the snake oil (ie a pivot would have failed) . It's a yes/no question without preconception from me and I'd appreciate a response or explanation...
- ChuckMcM 11y ago
  I think its a valid question on pivots, but its also pretty much the sole discretion of the founder/CEO to actually do the pivot. Without them on board and leading the change you end up with a mess, some people following the "strong" leaders and some people following the "original" leaders, and nobody gets anything done to their satisfaction. It also affects your team makeup, since at the small scale one tries to craft a team with overlapping but interlocking skill sets. Pivots require restructuring for that reason, and being able to pull that off is a skill as well. At the end of the day, if the CEO is thinking the "least risk / best shot" is to stay the course, then a pivot is off the table until you replace the CEO.

harryh 11y ago

Also, maybe they think that even if they can't get a product to market their patents will end up having value down the road. I'm less confident in this guess though as valuing patents in this area is well out of my area of expertise.

Animats 11y ago

Reminds me of Moller and his flying car.[1] Moller has been announcing a flying car Real Soon Now since 1974.[2] It still doesn't work, although he's spent lots of money over four decades, and been in trouble with the SEC. This may be a record for the longest running scam. It's outlived Madoff and the Keely Motor. Technically, the problem is that Moller is trying to do it with Wankel engines, rather than jet turbines. He has some very high power to weight Wankel engines, and at least briefly, he's been able to get the thing a few meters off the ground. But the Wankels can't maintain that power level for long. Jet turbines can, but they cost too much. (Want a hard problem to work on? Build a small, cheap, reliable jet engine. Many people have tried. Willams got the furthest.[3] The general result is that, below 6-passenger bizjet size, smaller jet engines don't get much cheaper. Small jet engines have been built, but the price doesn't come down much if you want the reliability and life of an aircraft engine.) [1] http://www.moller.com http://www.moller.com [2] http://www.downside.com/scams/moller/ http://www.downside.com/scams/moller/ [3] http://www.williams-int.com/ http://www.williams-int.com/

regularfry 10y ago
The challenge is [small, cheap, reliable, not deafeningly loud, possible to hook an axle to]. Pulse jets win at the first three, and utterly fail at the last two.
- wycx 10y ago
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKHz7wOjb9w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKHz7wOjb9w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsXWspo5hrc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsXWspo5hrc Perhaps you could say that hooking an axle to a pulsejet is impractical, rather than impossible.
tzm 10y ago
Or 36 tiny ducted electric fan motors.. http://www.bbc.com/autos/story/20160512-the-flying-machine-in-your-back-garden http://www.bbc.com/autos/story/20160512-the-flying-machine-i...

rasz_pl 11y ago

Thats weird, because actual real engineers realized what is possible, and what would be the result of trying to deliver the lie BEFORE company managed to scam first $20mil. In case you are wondering this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YI3NoBeNwfk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YI3NoBeNwfk is the likely outcome of trying to charge couple of phones at the same time in enclosed space the size of starbucks (actual pitch at some point) with this technology.

harryh 10y ago
Managed to scam 20 million out of who? Mark Suster doesn't sound like he feels scammed and his fund has put in as much money as anyone.
- osullivj 10y ago
  Mark Suster has invested a lot of his own money, and his investors, in uBeam. So of course he'll talk it up. No way will be ever do or say anything that will harm the value of his own investment. We call it "talking your own book".

danmaz74 11y ago

> The actual engineers working on the project (including the one in this "spat") at some point realize the actual limitations of what is possible physics wise From reading the blog of their former VP of engineering [0] I got the impression that the actual engineers were aware from the start of the limitations of what was physically possible. Instead, said engineer seems to have only realized with time something else: that the founder and CEO was perfectly at ease with making unrealistic promises to raise truckloads of funding at valuations that were impossible to justify with the performances he (and the other engineers) knew were physically possible. [0] http://liesandstartuppr.blogspot.com/ http://liesandstartuppr.blogspot.com/

tluyben2 10y ago
When the company came out in public, there were enough physics people who said that anyone with knowledge of physics can discredit this on the back of a beermat. And a lot of them did (search Ubeam hoax etc). The due diligence on the part of the investors is shocking as they were clearly told (as was advertised everywhere when they got their millions) that this would charge your phone at quite a distance (you sitting/walking in a room and having your phone charging while doing that).

_pmf_ 10y ago

> The actual engineers working on the project (including the one in this "spat") at some point realize the actual limitations of what is possible physics wise Assuming they finished high school, that point would be the first day on their job.

skbohra123 10y ago

its 100% possible to transfer the energy(electricity) from one ) Place to other, For that we have to think the same something differently, Example1: We can transfer the energy by wind media(Wind Energy). We can transfer the light energy as well (like Solar). What i thing by this the efficiency of the system is very low, but we can't say that this is not possible.

jasonlaramburu 10y ago

Every year there are companies in SV that raise Tens of millions of dollars without any public prototype, and many fold before they release their product. Most of the time, such failures are not newsworthy. Why is this case so polarizing?