Wearable technology, as it stands, is hampered by several technologies that haven’t quite caught up to their promise just yet. One of the most significant of these is power consumption. These devices use a lot of energy and, more than that, are hampered aesthetically by the breadth and width of today’s battery technology. This is a problem because the stuff we wear, particularly actual clothes, need to be flexible and flowy. A stiff battery would ruin that whole idea, thus making us walk around like some kind of square. Who wants that? Nobody! Scientists have long been working on fully flexible batteries, primarily for wearable tech use and there has been much promise shown. However, as of yet, no holy grail. Well, here is another contender for said grail.
A California company called Imprint Energy have just unveiled their foray into the flexible battery field. These zinc-polymer batteries are quite flexible, acting almost like paper. Also, they are printable, meaning that the manufacturing process of said batteries would be easier than one would imagine. They are appropriately calling these batteries ZincPoly batteries. Get it? Because they use a zinc-polymer. Da dum dum? They are also non-toxic, which is especially important considering these batteries will probably be hovering close or on your skin nearly all of the time. Nice! Toxicity sucks.
The company has intrigued many investors, scoring over $6 million bucks to finish these batteries up. With that in mind, don’t go looking around at Radio Shack expecting to see these on store shelves. It’ll be a while. In the meantime, learn to embrace the clunk.
