The Dream of Wireless Power Lives On
In 1899, deep inside his Colorado Springs laboratory, Nikola Tesla stood surrounded by arcs of blue lightning. He held a lightbulb in his hand — not plugged into anything — and it glowed.
Tesla had done the impossible: he transmitted power through the air. To him, this was the future. He imagined a world where energy flowed invisibly, wirelessly — powering cities, homes, and machines without cords or batteries.
More than a century later, that dream is finally taking shape — not with massive towers of lightning, but through small, efficient systems designed for the modern world. We’re entering an age where power can move through the air the same way data moves through Wi-Fi.
That’s what this issue is about — a company that’s already turning this next leap in energy technology into reality. It’s not theory or concept anymore; this firm is producing real systems that deliver electricity through the air, powering devices without cords or batteries.
I like investing in where the world is headed, not where it’s been. I’m always looking for emerging trends to invest in before they go mainstream — and this move toward truly wireless energy is one of them.
As part of the Trendpost Quick Takes series, I’ll be covering Energous (NASDAQ: WATT) — a small-cap pioneer leading this transformation, working to make over-the-air power as common and seamless as Wi-Fi.
Powering the Wireless World
We’re surrounded by sensors — and we don’t even notice them. Every warehouse, grocery store, and shipping container is lined with tiny devices quietly collecting data about temperature, movement, and inventory. It’s the nervous system of the modern economy.
But there’s a problem no one likes to talk about: batteries.
Every one of those sensors needs power. And when you scale from thousands to millions of devices, battery maintenance becomes a nightmare. Someone has to find every dead sensor, replace its battery, and reset it. It’s slow, costly, and full of blind spots.
It’s not unusual for large retailers or pharmaceutical distributors to spend millions every year just to keep their “smart” systems alive — not because the sensors are broken, but because their batteries are dead.
This is the quiet bottleneck holding back what’s known as the Internet of Things — the growing network of connected devices, from warehouse sensors to household gadgets, that share data and help the world run more efficiently.
⚙️ Energous: Wi-Fi for Electricity
Energous is tackling that problem head-on by building what it calls a Wireless Power Network — essentially, Wi-Fi for electricity.
Instead of plugging sensors into outlets or relying on coin-cell batteries, Energous uses radio-frequency (RF) energy to deliver power over the air. Its transmitters — called PowerBridges — act like power routers, sending small amounts of energy across a space. Battery-free sensors harvest that energy and feed data into a central network.
The result? A warehouse, store, or factory where thousands of devices stay powered continuously — no cables, no charging, no downtime.
It’s not a gadget. It’s an infrastructure shift — a new layer of connectivity that removes the single biggest friction point in IoT adoption: battery dependence.
🏭 Real-World Impact
In logistics and cold-chain operations, dead batteries can cause spoiled products and lost revenue. Energous fixes that by enabling always-on visibility.
One Fortune 10 pharmaceutical customer that used to lose roughly $5 million a year due to supply-chain blind spots is now deploying Energous’ wireless network nationwide to eliminate that loss.
In retail, Energous powers electronic shelf labels and smart tags without the cost or waste of batteries.
In manufacturing, it keeps thousands of sensors alive across vast factory floors.
Once power becomes ambient, the number of connected devices can finally scale without limits.
💡 The Rise of Ambient IoT
Analysts call this new era the Ambient Internet of Things — a network where sensors, tags, and objects communicate constantly and never run out of power.
Regulation is speeding adoption:
That means companies will soon need battery-free solutions — and Energous is already supplying them.
At the same time, global sustainability and ESG mandates favor Energous’ model. Every coin-cell battery avoided is one less piece of toxic waste. Multiply that by billions of sensors, and you get a massive environmental win.
📊 Momentum Building
Energous is finally showing real commercial traction — and the numbers prove it.
Q2 2025 (ended June 30):
Q3 2025 (ended September 30, preliminary):
Energous also announced a multi-phase contract with a Fortune 10 retailer to deploy its 2 W PowerBridge transmitters across approximately 4,700 U.S. locations — its largest commercial rollout yet.
It joined the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Partner Network, with three active proof-of-concept projects underway across major global enterprises in telecom, logistics, and food & beverage.
Together, these moves show Energous shifting decisively from R&D toward full commercial execution — with repeat orders, major brand validation, and an expanding partnership pipeline.
🌍 Why It Matters
Every industrial revolution needs its infrastructure. For the digital one, that infrastructure isn’t just about data networks — it’s about power. As devices, robots, and AI systems multiply, powering them efficiently becomes just as critical as connecting them.
Energous sits at that intersection. Its technology reduces waste by eliminating disposable batteries, cuts maintenance costs by removing the need for constant recharging or replacement, and ensures continuity by keeping data flowing around the clock. It’s a cleaner, more efficient, and more reliable way to power the connected world.
If it succeeds, Energous could become the power backbone for the next trillion-device economy — the silent enabler of everything from smart supply chains to intelligent cities.
🧭 Trendpost Takeaway
We talk a lot about AI, automation, and data — but none of that works without power. Not just electricity from the grid, but distributed energy that keeps billions of devices alive without human intervention.
That’s the megatrend Energous is riding.
As the world moves toward autonomous systems, AI-driven logistics, and connected infrastructure, the need for self-powered devices will explode. Battery maintenance simply can’t scale to that level.
That’s why wireless power networks — what Energous calls Ambient IoT — are more than a convenience. They’re the next layer of the digital infrastructure stack, as critical as Wi-Fi was in the early 2000s.
For investors, that means opportunity. This is a small-cap company on the front line of a long-term shift — one where power, data, and intelligence merge into a seamless network.
If Energous keeps converting pilots into full deployments, its growth curve could resemble early Wi-Fi or RFID — small at first, then exponential once adoption takes hold.
Energous isn’t just selling hardware. It’s quietly building the invisible power grid that could fuel the next wave of intelligent machines.
For me as an investor, Energous fits perfectly into my long-term strategy of owning small, high-conviction positions in companies aligned with megatrends. I am starting with a one-half position at $7.50, and I’ll look to add another half-position if the stock dips significantly — but only if the fundamentals continue to strengthen quarter by quarter.
⚠️ A Note on Risk
Investing in early-stage companies like Energous comes with risk. The technology is promising, but it’s still in the early innings — there’s no guarantee it will achieve mass adoption or even remain standing a few years from now. These kinds of ventures can be volatile and unpredictable. That’s why I treat positions like this as speculative — small, long-term bets on ideas that could either fade quietly or help shape the future.