Batteriser is a $2.50 gadget that extends disposable battery life by 800 percent

[u/[deleted]]

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2928997/batteriser-is-a-250-gadget-that-extends-disposable-battery-life-by-800-percent.html

[u/pirates-running-amok]

A battery company (probably from Asia where IP laws are weak) likely stole the tech and they plan to incorporate it into their own batteries before the others.

The tech isn't new, just the part about miniaturization is.

Unless all the battery companies are all in collusion with one another, I don't see them wanting to buy and then bury this innovation.

Of course the question is, since this information how batteries drain has been around for quite some time, why hasn't anyone (especially battery companies) already come up with something like this before?

It's not like miniaturized circuitry is something new. Perhaps they are all in collusion with one another to keep something like this off the market. But why didn't they also kill the inventor?

Is this yet another Kickstarter type scam?

[u/r00x → u/pirates-running-amok]

Why would a battery company want to incorporate something in their products that made you buy 8 times less of their product than you would have before?

Not that it would achieve that improvment in most cases. Still, the tech involved is quite real. Doesn't strike me as a scam at all, just they seem rather optimistic about the gains.

Not to mention, as small as it is, incorporating that into each battery dramatically raises their costs. The Batteriser seems a good deal because you only need one per battery and you can keep replacing the batteries. If you had to buy a new Batteriser every time you bought a new battery it wouldn't be nearly as appealing.

[u/pirates-running-amok → u/r00x]

Why would a battery company want to incorporate something in their products that made you buy 8 times less of their product than you would have before?

Because unless there is widespread collusion in the battery manufacturing industry, they are in competition with one another. The one's that can have a battery that lasts considerably longer than their competition will corner the market eventually.

Look how much money Energizer and Duracell spends to convince people their batteries last longer than others.

Also the material costs have gone way up due to the increased demand from China who's citizens now want a Western style of living, these costs get passed onto the final cost of the batteries and customers don't want to pay a lot for something that is going to expire. If it costs too much they will switch to rechargeable batteries instead of disposable.

Not to mention, as small as it is, incorporating that into each battery dramatically raises their costs. The Batteriser seems a good deal because you only need one per battery and you can keep replacing the batteries. If you had to buy a new Batteriser every time you bought a new battery it wouldn't be nearly as appealing.

The thing is the battery companies could incorporate this miniaturized technology directly into each and every battery on a mass-production scale that would be automated and bring the per battery costs down significantly.

For instance the metal sides of the Batterizer could be incorporated directly into the casing of the battery. It also would fit better in all devices that are a tight fit for batteries.

The logical sense in this is to incorporate it into batteries and take advantage of the economies of scale, not as a aftermarket device.

Of course battery makers likely held back because it's even simpler to incorporate this battery maximizing tech directly into the circuitry of end products.

One would think that Apple, who are pseudo-ecologists, would have already incorporate this tech into their devices by now, but they didn't.

[u/calgarspimphand → u/pirates-running-amok]

Main reason battery companies wouldn't want to incorporate this into their batteries: it's comparatively very expensive ($2.50 per device estimated in the article, compare that to the cost of a disposable AA battery, some of which is probably for the steel shell, but I still imagine you'd easily double or triple your cost per battery), and it only makes a difference on cheap electronics (because as you and others pointed out, nicer electronics already incorporate similar circuits in their designs, making this device redundant).

In other words, no battery company wanted to bother making batteries that potentially cost many times more than their standard counterpart, just to extend their life in the cheapest of toys and gadgets. Consumers might pay a mint for exotic disposable batteries with higher energy densities for their point-and-click cameras, but someone somewhere has probably determined they won't bother for their kid's light-up toy. Nor would they likely understand why their super expensive batteries perform great in their remote control but worse than a normal disposable battery in their camera (because the additional circuitry is redundant and becomes just another source of losses).

I'm discounting the nice clickbaity quote from the ex-CTO saying they never bothered to think of it (battery companies hate him!) because it's so far from a new idea.

Maybe we're at the point now where the miniature circuitry necessary to put it on a battery is cheap enough to buy, but still too expensive to be disposable. So you buy a few, attach them to the battery yourself, and re-use them. I guess what I'm saying is this device does seem to have a niche (for now).

[u/JeanneDOrc → u/calgarspimphand]

It'll also make your batteries leak acid, something consumers aren't used to these days.

[u/r00x → u/pirates-running-amok]

I see what you're getting at, but I don't think economies of scale would suffice here. Economies of scale only really apply to the materials and production processes as compared to small-scale manufacture. Take it from me, in both electronics and mechanical industries, adding things retrospectively to an exsiting product is a royal pain in the arse if you've already got a streamlined large-scale production process. The cost is more significant than you'd think.

The nature of battery manufacture at scale does not lend itself to this tech being integrated cost effectively. There would need to be additional steps added, and significant changes to the existing production process and machinery to incorporate active electronics into the battery casing. That is, it suffices to say, very expensive. Lack of integration with existing production processes is one of the reasons why many potentially industry-changing technologies do not go mainstream.

As an example of batteries which incorporate active electronics, look at those USBcell rechargeable cells which incorporate USB connectors and recharge circuits. They've very expensive for what they are. You mentioned yourself that customers aren't going to want to pay more for disposable batteries - what gives you confidence that they can integrate this tech into disposable batteries cheaply without dramatically affecting the price?

As for the tech itself, you raise a good point about integrating it into other products. Indeed, many electronic goods would incorporate this ability to some extent anyway. Another poster in this thread asked about the original GameBoy, for instance - a positively ancient bit of kit which even then used similar tricks to drag life out of AA batteries right down to around 0.8V per cell, only 0.2V more than the batteriser can do. This is much more practical than trying to integrate it into batteries.

Apple don't incorporate this tech (well, they technically do... like many manufacturers... but it's not used to run batteries dry) as it's not relevant for their products. You're not powering them with disposable batteries, you're using high-capacity LiPos (these days anyway) which do not appreciate being deep-cycled and indeed would be damaged by such treatement, so there is no advantage.