Wireless power, the ability to deliver electricity to gadgets without plugging those gadgets into a cable, is a hotbed of innovation at the moment. The dominant standard, called “Qi,” is ever under attack from other efforts.

This week saw interesting developments from Energous (WATT), which aims to transfer power via radio frequency transceivers, with limited results so far, and some controversy about its business.

There are other contenders. On Wednesday in Las Vegas, during the Consumer Electronics Show, I met with Alex Lidow, who is founder of a privately held chip company EPC of El Segundo, California.

Barron's
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This article takes a deep dive into lidar technology. It explains how the technology works and the challenges technologists face as they try to build lidar sensors that meet the demanding requirements for commercial self-driving cars.

The bottom line is that while bringing lidar costs down will take a significant amount of difficult engineering work, there don't seem to be any fundamental barriers to bringing the cost of high-quality lidar down below $1,000—and eventually below $100. That means the technology—and ultimately, self-driving vehicles that depend on lidar—should be well within reach for ordinary consumers.

Ars Techinca
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To ensure widespread adoption, wireless power systems need to move beyond small charging pads and become active power sources over large surface areas. For magnetic resonant systems, this demands fundamental changes in coil technology, system architecture, and power amplifiers. Gallium nitride based amplifiers have proven capable of delivering 60 W with greater than 90 percent efficiency into the transmit coil over a wide load range.

By: Yuanzhe Zhang and Michael A. de Rooij
Power Electronics Europe
November/December 2017
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Alex Lidow, CEO of Efficient Power Conversion, talks to Leo Laporte about Gallium Nitride, and how it is being used to create the next generation of microchips and wirelessly power the world.

This Week in Technology
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Alex Lidow, CEO and co-founder of Efficient Power Conversion Corporation, has demonstrated the ability to transmit power from large surfaces.

Digital Journal
September 18, 2017
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Nextbigfuture interviewed Alex Lidow, CEO of EPC. EPC is a leader in Gallium Nitride electronics and now is leading the charge to a new age of wireless power. In 5 to 10 years, we could begin to see entire houses or office buildings switching from costly wiring of buildings to a complete large area wireless solution.

NextBigFuture
September 9, 2017
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This scientist got his Ph.D 40 years ago who saved the world's 15% energy consumption at one time. He is continuing his journey of innovations now in discovering silicon's replacement material for humankind.

My father always taught me that the true worth of an individual is measured based on their contribution to society. As I entered graduate school in 1975 I knew my passion was in the field of semiconductors, and I felt my best contribution to society would come from finding a successor to silicon. I did my graduate work in Gallium Arsenide, but realized by the time I received my PhD in 1977 that Gallium Arsenide’s prospects were limited as a semiconductor due to the basic materials properties, I went to work applying everything I learned to making better devices in silicon.

Fortune China
June 15, 2017
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During last week's PCIM Europe event in Nuremberg, Germany, direct 48V-to-1V power conversion architectures were a significant topic. “The use of GaN switches in 48V-to-1V direct dc-dc converters can improve system performance by 30%, compared with today’s best silicon-based designs,” commented Alex Lidow, CEO of Efficient Power Conversion.

PowerPulse
May 31, 2017
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The number one barrier to improving every electronic product – from smart wearables and laptops to handheld tools and electric cars – is battery technology. The current state-of-the-art in rechargeable batteries, Lithium Ion, has been around for 25 years. As tech goes, that’s pretty old. It’s time for something new, don’t you think?

Fortune
Steve Tobak
May 13, 2016
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Silicon -- the core ingredient in semiconductors and the driving force behind the electronics industry -- is reaching its limit, says Alex Lidow, CEO of Efficient Power Conversion Corporation. His Los Angeles-based company is investigating the capacity of gallium nitride (GaN) to disrupt the $400 billion (£277bn) silicon industry with its improved powers of semiconducting. "This is the first 
time that there is a semiconductor that is both lower cost and has a higher performance than silicon," Lidow says.

Wired Magazine
Emma Bryce
March 31, 2016
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You might have seen some behind-the-scenes tweets from the life of the ECN editor (and News Director) and while a picture is worth a thousand words, sometimes an engineer's perspective on a conference is worth a little more.

With that in mind, I reached out to some APEC engineers and attendees to get the lowdown on this year's Applied Power Electronics Conference in Long Beach, CA. We talked about how the show compared to last year, the biggest trends, and how APEC went for their companies.

ECNMag.com
Kasey Panetta
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At this year’s APEC 2016, news about GaN power technology was probably more dominant than at any time in the past. Real product demos using GaN, new product and technology announcements, attention to GaN in the plenary, and other discussions all reinforced the impression that GaN power devices have arrived and the technology is making inroads in the marketplace. One of the tell-tale signs is a slight shift in the discussions, away from what the devices can do to what else is needed to support the design-in of GaN power transistors.

How2Power Today
David Morrison
April 1, 2016
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Power transistors with faster switching speeds will enable power supplies with smaller form factors and higher energy transfer efficiencies. Indeed, the elimination of heat sinks will give designers the ability to visualize entirely new form factors for power bricks and modules, including those enabling wireless power transfers. Gallium-nitride (GaN) transistors fabricated on silicon substrates can boost efficiencies and help shrink the footprint of power supplies.

Electronic Design
March, 2016
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Efficient Power Conversion (EPC) CEO Alex Lidow tells Light Reading he might be within two years of a breakthrough that would upend the entire semiconductor market: CMOS logic implemented in gallium nitride (GaN).

Light Reading
By: Brian Santo
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Alex Lidow, scion of an engineering dynasty, thinks the essential material at the heart of the tech industry needs to change. Lidow, 60, is currently head of a company called Efficient Power Conversion, and is one of the tech world’s loudest advocates for making transistors and semiconductors from gallium nitride. Silicon is traditionally used for the transistors and semiconductors on which the technology industry relies. This is an amazingly lucrative business: according to the Semiconductor Industry Association, which represents U.S.-based firms, the worldwide semiconductor industry was responsible for approximately $335.8 billion of sales last year alone.

Fast Company
September, 2015
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The cost of electrical power is a key driver of socioeconomic vitality, as it enables us to improve our quality of life and advance new applications and industries. GaN (gallium nitride) has emerged as a displacement technology to the venerable, but aged, silicon solutions that will allow us to stay ahead of our demand for more and more efficient power.

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If expanding industries typically indicate vibrancy, a race to acquire and consolidate is generally reflective of the opposite – a period of slowed growth in mature, often once high-flying categories. And while many industries experience a period of stardom, followed by a sharp and steady decline, we should be extremely worried when they occur in industries that are fundamentally central to our socio-economic vitality.

Forbes
June 26, 2015
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The effort to take advantage of gallium nitride is partly a response to technical and economic factors that have slowed improvement in silicon-based chips.  While companies are still finding ways to fabricate smaller transistors in silicon, reductions in cost and power consumption have been more difficult to achieve. But gallium-nitride circuits can switch on and off much more quickly than silicon and handle higher voltages, said Alex Lidow, EPC’s chief executive. That makes the material particularly good for chores that involve power conversion.

Wall Street Journal
June 22, 2015
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Power conversion involves creating tiny devices that convert electricity from one form to another, enabling all manner of electrical gadgets to function. Till now, silicon had been the preferred medium for power conversion processors, but as that element reaches the limits of its efficiency, attention has focused on new materials.

Los Angeles Business Journal
June 21, 2015
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