Olga Kharif discussed the current state of the next big thing in mobile phone technology: wireless charging. Highlights include:

• While the number of devices that support wireless charging is small, it is projected to rapidly expand with 100 million units being shipped by 2015.
• It takes about as long to charge a phone through a wireless connection as it does through a wired one.
• Businesses such as Starbucks and Delta Air Lines’ Sky Club have begun to embed the standard into table tops that  guests sit around. Customers can simply pull out their phone – if it has the technology – set it on the table, and watch it charge.
• Best Buy, Walmart, and Madison Square Garden are other organizations that are testing the technology.
• The biggest roadblock at the moment is that different companies are using different standards, and a single unified standard has yet to emerge.

Read more about the various players in the battle over wireless charge, and why people are so interested in it over here.

Source: Business Week