uBeam Promo Video

I recently wrote about the large layoffs at uBeam, and the new website, however I had missed their new promotional video that was posted on the 5th June.

Similar to the website, it shows charging of phones by peoples heads (insufficient power delivery to be practical, tracking for such application never demonstrated, and IMO not safe), forklift trucks (just not even close to the power requirements there), and all the while powering huge numbers of distributed devices with a line-of-sight technology implying massive numbers of transmitters. It also has babies and animals so of course it's "ultra-safe" as it just bounces off the skin (as long as there's no hair, in which case there will be heating and possibly burns at high power, but that's just a detail) and the voice over assures us it's for any application. Hmmmmm, I smell something...

I will say, at least this website/promo theme isn't set in space, where sound literally cannot propagate, simply because the CEO "likes space".

This made me wonder about the timing of the firings - that it wasn't that they had run out of money, but rather that they had finally reached the combination of Murata-style devices they manufacture themselves to be able to claim "proprietary transducers" along with sufficient marketing materials (even though IMO the "product" is absolutely not viable) they can claim to have something to sell.  Sufficient smoke in the machine and enough mirrors there's a bit of hope a purchaser will not be paying attention? Knowing it's a dud and there's no future, did they then just deep-six the development team because they had done their job and were now simply surplus to requirements? I've said before I think their RF based rival, Energous, is a company designed to sell shares who uses engineering as their marketing, but have uBeam effectively done the same now? Quite why anyone with sense would buy into a tech that is at v0.9 and there's nobody to even provide support for the beta let alone build you a next-gen system, I do not know, but there seems to be dumb people out there with money to burn.

If true though, it's another reminder to employees - you are a "human resource" and the second you're not needed, you'll be removed no matter the impact to you. Be careful what you commit to any company, do the work you're paid for but don't forget that loyalty is a one-way street.

When (and why) did Perry leave as CEO?

According to uBeam, Perry left the company in September 2018 to "spend more time with her next project" (9 months later, still not appeared), handing over the reigns to interim-CEO McCauley. Shortly after that McCauley updated her resume to show she'd been interim CEO since July, and now it's updated again to show since May 2018. Three resume changes on a date that is not really ambiguous - as Goldfinger says, once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action.

Interestingly, the COO also left uBeam in May 2018, after barely 9 months on the job. He was someone immensely qualified to do the COO role, and even the CEO role - a position most who noted his hiring expected he had been brought on for. Is there a connection and is there more to this story than meets the eye?