It’s a sunny time for solar energy — and for good motive: it’s considerable, renewable, and sustainable. Because the world is popping in direction of various power sources, photo voltaic is the quickest rising renewable. Actually, it accounts for over half of the 302GW of renewable capability put in internationally in 2021.
However there’s nonetheless an extended option to go. And one sector that photo voltaic can have a seismic distinction? Client tech.
Swedish deeptech scaleup Exeger entered this house in 2009, with the imaginative and prescient to harness photo voltaic power for shopper electronics and make battery life woes a factor of the previous.
Now, 13 years later, the corporate counts greater than 200 workers and has two photo voltaic cell factories in Stockholm, the place it engineers and produces its patented {hardware}. Referred to as Powerfoyle, the expertise may be seamlessly built-in into current units, enabling them to rework indoor and outside gentle into nearly limitless power.
Presently, six merchandise utilizing Exeger’s expertise have been commercialized. Three of them are solar-powered headphones: the Urbanista Los Angeles, the Urbanista Phoenix, and the Adidas RPT-02 Sol. The corporate has additionally built-in Powerfoyle into the Blue Tiger Solare communication headset, the POC Omne Everlasting bike helmet, and the Spåra Hund, a self-powered canine harness.
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To learn the way this all began, I spoke with Giovanni Fili, the corporate’s founder and CEO.
Having a 20-year background in entrepreneurship, over 20 years of commercialization expertise , and greater than 23 years working with clear tech, he instructed TNW that wanting into the on a regular basis functions of solar energy felt like a pure step.
“We began out with a nanotech invention, we made it right into a part, after which we made a brand new photo voltaic cell from it,” Fili stated.
“We realized after just a few years that this had an enormous potential as a result of we will display print this photo voltaic cell, which permits a free-form design with completely different shapes, colours, and textures. This, in flip, permits us to combine Powerfoyle in current merchandise which are bought in billion models per 12 months — giving them everlasting battery life mainly.”
Powerfoyle: a brand new sort of photo voltaic cell
In contrast to typical photo voltaic cells, Powerfoyle is a silicon-free expertise. Exeger has changed silicon with titanium dioxide and reinvented what is named a Dye Sensitized Photo voltaic Cell (DSC). “Which means we have now a coloration, a dye, which absorbs the sunshine like synthetic photosynthesis,” Fili explains.
In nature, chlorophyll is what allows photosynthesis, by which vegetation remodel gentle power into water, oxygen, and carbon dioxide. Likewise, Exeger’s dye can take in the sunshine from any angle beneath any gentle circumstances, indoors or outdoor.
On the core of the DSC expertise stands a singular conductive electrode materials, which has changed the generally used and costly Indium tin Oxide (ITO) layer.
Powerfoyle’s chemistry and structure lead to a cell that’s not delicate to partial shading — one of many greatest issues concerning energy losses in photo voltaic cell techniques, since shading only one cell in a module can cut back the ability output to zero.
Based on Fili, even when Powerfoyle will get partial gentle publicity, it nonetheless works. That’s as a result of the total visible floor of the cell is lively, which implies that even in the event you cowl a part of it, the remaining half going through the sunshine will nonetheless produce electrical energy.
As to why this profitable expertise isn’t used for photo voltaic panels, that’s as a result of conventional photo voltaic cells are extra power environment friendly in relation to large-scale energy manufacturing.
How customizable is Powerfoyle?
“That’s the place the cell’s distinctive chemistry and our free-form printing approach are available,” Exeger’s CEO says.
The fabric may be made into nearly any sort or type, and may be produced in sizes starting from 15cm² to 500cm² — that means it may possibly match into the product it’ll be charging.
In relation to textures, there are over 100 completely different choices, together with leather-based, brushed metal, carbon fiber, material, and wooden.
This enables Powerfoyle to be built-in into curved surfaces like headbands or helmets and seamlessly mix with an current system.
Because of this, whereas solar-powered headphones are the corporate’s hottest product to this point, the scaleup envisions — and is engaged on — numerous different utility areas. These embody transportable audio system and e-readers within the shopper electronics phase, in addition to IoT units equivalent to trackers, sensors, and distant controls. On high of this, Exeger can be planning on integrating Powerfoyle into helmets, vests, and listening to safety for sensible workplaces.
Integrating an influence supply
Based on Fili, producing the photo voltaic cells is a fast-paced course of. “We print with excessive velocity printers. So I feel one print takes about 23 seconds, and we manufacture roughly 100 or 200 cells with that one print,” he instructed me.
Following manufacturing, Exeger ships the cells to its companions together with directions on the right way to combine them into their product. However I had a query: how straightforward is the combination course of?
I spoke with Tuomas Lonka, Model & Advertising and marketing Director of Urbanista, which labored along with Exeger to launch its two solar-powered headphones, the Los Angeles and the Phoenix.
“We work in shut collaboration with Exeger in making essentially the most out of the expertise throughout the context by which we’re creating our product,” Lonka defined. “What’s actually nice is which you can combine the expertise so properly which you can barely inform that there’s a photo voltaic cell.”
“In relation to solar-powered headphones, improvement time is barely longer than that of your common product,” he defined. “Nevertheless, what I might say is that we have now been in a position to work extraordinarily quick contemplating that that is the primary time this expertise is delivered to market and we have now now executed two merchandise in two years.”
Infinite battery life?
From a shopper perspective, proudly owning a tool that repeatedly costs by gentle brings an enormous profit: power independence. However how precisely does this work in apply?
Powerfoyle harvests electrical energy in all gentle circumstances: from sunshine to synthetic indoor gentle. Naturally, the photo voltaic cell costs essentially the most when the solar is vivid. It might nonetheless harvest sufficient power throughout a cloudy day, which is diminished when it costs through synthetic gentle, and involves a halt in darkness.
I requested Fili how lengthy it takes for the headphones to cost.
“They cost on a regular basis. That’s the purpose,” he says. “To present you a generic reply, about 15 to twenty minutes of solar publicity will probably be sufficient so that you can have an hour of listening. That’s what the shoppers care about.”
“With regular use the headphones will all the time be totally charged, you’ll nearly by no means deplete the battery.”
Talking particularly about Urbanista’s headphones, Lonka explains that charging time relies on the scale of the photo voltaic patch and the kind of gentle you expose them to.
“In case you’re in Portugal versus Stockholm, for instance, the quantity of daylight through the day could be very completely different, however roughly what we have now been saying is that with Phoenix for instance — the photo voltaic floor of which is a little bit bit smaller than that of Los Angeles — you get one to 1. This implies an hour in daylight ought to offer you roughly an hour of playtime.”
“In fact, when the battery is full, the product isn’t going to cost additional than that. However however, it’s continually charging. We begin getting numerous suggestions from individuals who have purchased the Los Angeles and say that they’ve had it for a number of months, with out ever needing to plug it in.”
“What’s possibly extra vital for shoppers is absolutely tackling that predominant ache level with wi-fi merchandise, which is that you just continually must be plugging them in or, or expertise battery anxiousness,” he notes. “It’s that you just don’t actually need to consider charging them that a lot anymore.”
However what’s the additional price shoppers should pay for such a power independence?
The Urbanista Los Angeles price €199 — €50 costlier than the Urbanista Miami which provide the identical capabilities sans the Powerfoyle tech. The identical goes for the Adidas RPT-02 Sol priced at €229, in comparison with the non-solar Adidas RTP-01 that price €169.
Driving sustainability
Photo voltaic-powered merchandise are the following step in environmental accountability, each for manufacturers and their shoppers.
“There are zero emissions coming from Powefoyle’s manufacturing,” Fili says.
Past that, solar-powered units can cut back further cables (together with their respective manufacturing emissions and waste disposal) in addition to charging from the grid. To get an concept of the potential power financial savings, the market demand for headphones in 2020 amounted to 514.5 million models, with a quantity forecast of 1,335.7 million models in 2027.
Likewise, the worldwide gross sales for distant controls are anticipated to exceed 630 million models by 2029, which roughly interprets to greater than two billion discarded batteries per 12 months.
These excessive numbers, nevertheless, carry a big environmental benefit: elevated shopper engagement with sustainable applied sciences. Introducing solar-powered units into on a regular basis life cultivates a relationship with a brand new sort of fresh power, which may shift shopper decisions right into a extra sustainable way of life.
A bumpy highway to success
As fascinating as Powerfoyle expertise sounds, growing and commercializing it has been no mattress of roses, translating into greater than a decade of effort.
“Once we got here up with this progressive concept, it was tough to persuade folks to spend money on it,” Fili says. “Typically I ponder how I did that, suggesting that the tech would possibly work in 10 or 12 years. You want individuals who wish to be on the experience for a very long time. It is a long run recreation. And we managed to seek out them. Up till now we have now raised €180 million.”
Regardless of the unfavorable odds, Fili noticed a fantastic market alternative. He explains how the important thing was integrating the expertise into shopper merchandise that promote by hundreds of thousands of models per 12 months.
“Proper now there’s no competitors, nobody can do what we do each design and efficiency-wise,” he notes. “When it comes to energy manufacturing, in the event you evaluate Powerfoyle to the normal photo voltaic cells they use on rooftops or photo voltaic parks, these cells are 40% extra environment friendly. However in the event you look throughout the areas we focus, Powerfoyle is far more environment friendly than the everyday photo voltaic cells.”
Shoppers are nonetheless unfamiliar with self-powered photo voltaic units, he provides. However he believes that the market is lastly getting traction.
“For 13 years no one believed us,” he explains. “However while you see now that we’re partnering with corporations like Adidas, you recognize that the expertise works. It’s exploding.”
I requested Fili, who has acquired the European Inventor of the 12 months 2021 award, what recommendation he would give to entrepreneurs who want to enter the sphere.
“The chance of success will increase in the event you work and suppose along with two or three different folks,” he notes. “Then after all imagine in your self and don’t quit, however primarily, concentrate on why your expertise is vital to folks. As a result of whether it is, it is possible for you to to promote it.”