[s_q_b]

Meredith Perry is no fraud. She was in a Penn graduate program before this venture, and has worked at NASA.

It's directional transmission technology. The power loss is minimized as the ultrasound is directed and focused at a particular location. There's no inverse square law here, and it's easily within the bound of known physics.

As far as I know, (indirect relationship with the a good friend of the founder, that I won't say anything more about to protect his privacy) Meredith is actually genius-level and a relentless work horse. I'd bet big on this one.

If I could work for any one company it would be uBeam. I just started a great position, and I'd do it despite the press. The moment they made an offer I'd be on a plane.

This is a "First they dismiss you. Then they laugh at you. Then you win" scenario.

[kybernetyk]

> This is a "First they dismiss you. Then they laugh at you. Then you win" scenario.

Then god knocks at your door and angrily asks why you didn't obey the laws of physics.

[s_q_b]

Tell me what part of the physics you find impossible.

[gerbal]

I don't care how smart she is, she can't defy the laws of physics. Also, the reflection and harmonics are going to drive any animals and/or children & teenagers nuts.

[s_q_b]

She's not defying the laws of physics. It's a tracked directional system that concentrates the ultrasound at the point of the device. Honestly, not even really that out there as far as the physics is concerned.

EDIT: Unlikely. Children hear better in upper ranges, not lower. And animals are unlikely to be too perturbed. These types of noises are generated naturally all the time.

The challenge here is the engineering. How precisely can you build the tracking? How much leakage is there? Are there problems with harmonics? How do you build an app that can relatively reliably 3d position a device relative to a base station. And finally, how do you get that base station to be able to simultaneously or rapidly re-aim itself to target each of the devices. That's hard, but certainly exciting and very possible.

[gerbal]

The patent application[1] lists the transmission frequency as 40-60kHz, a high frequency. Humans typically hear up to around 20kHz, dogs 44kHz, cats 79kHz. Not Low frequencies.

A directed, concentrated, high decibel volume, in the 40-60kHz range is not the sort of thing found naturally 'all of the time.' As other posters have mentioned, transmitting energy via sound is likely impossible do both safely and at useful amperage. Ultrasound is not safe at high energies even if you can't hear it.

[1] patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/pdfs/US20120299541.pdf

[s_q_b]

Initial patents rarely resemble final technology. There's something you get out right away. Most startups do this.

[gerbal]

Given that the patent followed a prototype, it has to in some way resemble the final tech.

The fact remains that Ultrasound is not an efficient mode of energy transmission [1]. Wireless induction is almost certainly more efficient over the same distances. And ultrasound is a potential nuisance and hazard to wildlife and pets in way EM broadcasts simply aren't.

[1] http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/IECON.2011.6119486