AirPower, which Apple announced back in 2017, has been dropped by the company because its engineers couldn’t solve thermal and interference issues, according to reports.
The mat was intended to charge multiple devices without needing to plug them in and the decision not to proceed will be a blow to the company – especially as Huawei and Samsung have already released products that can charge devices wirelessly.
"After much effort, we’ve concluded AirPower will not achieve our high standards and we have cancelled the project," the firm said.
While the company hasn’t elaborated the design appears to have been too complicated – based on a series of co-operative flux generators capable of charging a device once it had been located on the pad in software.
The problem for Apple is that the cancelled product could also affect sales of other wireless devices which were promoted and sold with the promise they would be charged using AirPower in future.
Apple had also talked about being able to charge up to three Apple products at once, providing a one-stop charging solution for people to power up their iPhone, AirPods, and Apple Watch.
It’s a rare miss-step for Apple.
