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Ki

February 2, 2025

After More Than a Decade, Wireless Power For The Kitchen Is Set to Become a Reality

It has been almost a decade since we at The Spoon began covering efforts to establish a wireless power standard for the kitchen.

Our coverage started when the Wireless Power Consortium (WPC) released its first white paper announcing plans to bring wireless power to kitchen appliances. Until then, the consortium was primarily known for developing the Qi standard, which enabled wireless phone charging. However, in February 2017, WPC revealed its vision to extend this technology to blenders, mixers, and other small appliances, aiming to eliminate power cords.

Eight years is a long time, but the push for wireless power in the kitchen actually began nearly four years earlier, in 2013, when Philips and Haier urged WPC to explore a kitchen standard. It would take nearly four more years for the initiative to gain traction among WPC members.

Given the lengthy lead-up to developing a kitchen standard, it’s no surprise that when WPC formally announced its efforts in 2017, the group was (overly) optimistic about when products would hit the market. “We could be looking at products out next year,” Hans Kablau, head of the WPC Kitchen standard, told me at the time.

While those products didn’t arrive in 2018, they now appear to be finally arriving in 2025. After unveiling its first Ki-compliant products in 2024, Midea plans to launch its Celestial Flex Series—which includes a blender, steamer, and kettle—this year. The company has yet to announce pricing, but representatives at WPC’s CES booth confirmed they expect the products to ship in 2025..

You can watch a demo at the WPC booth below:

A Look at The Cordless Power Tech Coming to Market in 2025

Other early Ki products, equipped with integrated transmission coils, are expected to include induction cooktops. However, WPC envisions the technology being installed beneath various countertop surfaces in the long run. The Ki standard is designed to work with non-metal surfaces such as marble, slate, granite, laminate, and wood.

Given its decade-plus gestation period, it’s not surprising that other startups have also attempted to integrate wireless power into appliances and kitchen surfaces. Last year, I covered Cloen, a Spanish startup that developed Cloen Cordless Technology (CCT)—a dual induction plate system capable of both heating cook zones and wirelessly powering countertop appliances. Since last year, Porcelanosa has featured Cloen’s technology in custom-designed kitchen countertops and furniture. The company is also working on a line of cordless countertop appliances under the BeCordless brand.

Another company, Kitchenery, has also been developing wireless power transfer technology and cordless cooking appliances. At CES, Kitchenery debuted its induction kettle, aimed at the RV and marine industries. The company is also partnering with appliance brands and OEMs to integrate its power-receiving system into various products. Kitchenery expects to begin shipping its Quantum energy pad and silent blender this year.

Watch our interview with CEO Akshay Bhuva below.

Kitchenery at CES 2025

The emergence of wireless power for the kitchen reflects a broader trend: technology is receding into the background as kitchens become more streamlined and functional. Advancements in AI, voice and gesture interfaces, and miniaturization are driving this transformation. Now, after more than a decade of development, wireless power is poised to play a key role in this shift.

September 6, 2024

Midea Debuts First Countertop Appliances to Use Ki Wireless Power Standard

Seven years after the Wireless Power Consortium first started working on a standard for countertop kitchen appliances, Midea announced the first product that works with the Ki standard. According to a story in The Verge, Midea announced its Celestial Flex Series of products, which includes a blender, steamer, and kettle, at the IFA show in Berlin.

Midea, one of China’s largest appliance brands, hasn’t said when its Ki lineup will ship, pricing, or regions to which it will ship. It also has not indicated if they are working on a Ki-compliant cooktop, (though it wouldn’t matter much to customers since any Ki-compliant cooktop should work). However, they did announce a new all-in-one built-in oven called the Midea One that has a built-in air fryer and automated multi-step cooking function capabilities.

The announcement of the first products is a big milestone for any standard, and Ki is no exception. And while it’s good to see a major manufacturer commit to the standard, the better part of a decade is a pretty long time for a standard to finally make it to market, which is probably why—as we reported earlier this year—some companies have taken it upon themselves to build wireless power products that don’t use the standard.

It will be interesting to watch if Cloen or others who have attempted to build non-Ki-based wireless power kitchen products will now begin to embrace Ki. My guess is they will since proprietary technologies are an uphill battle, particularly when trying to convince retailers to jump on board.

Initial Ki products with integrated transmission coils are expected to be indication cooktops, but in the long term, WPC expects the technology to be installed under the counter on quartz, granite, and marble countertops.

March 12, 2024

Why a Small Startup in the Middle of Valencia May Be Leading the Wireless Energy & Invisible Cooktop Trend

About a decade ago, IKEA famously released a concept video laying out its vision for the kitchen of the future. The central concept for their envisioned future kitchen was a kitchen table that not only made the experience of cooking and eating interactive with a touch interface, but also had built-in induction transmitters under the table’s surface that transmitted energy to power appliances and powered invisible-to-the-eye heating zones.

It was a compelling peek into what could be. While induction cooktop hob technology was and is a somewhat mature technology, the idea of using an induction transmitter to provide both wireless power and heating in everyday kitchen countertop surfaces fired up our imaginations in the same way Tom Cruise’s John Anderton character did about gesture interfaces more than two decades ago in Minority Report.

Since IKEA released its video, the futuristic idea of using an ordinary surface as a source of power and cooking heat has been inching slowly toward becoming a reality without ever seeming to make it to market. While there have been some efforts in standards-building by the same organization that brought us wireless phone charging standard Qi, actual product introductions of kitchen surfaces with built-in wireless power and heating have been pretty much non-existent.

But that’s changed over the twelve months thanks to a company named Cloen. Nestled on the east coast of the Iberian peninsula, this small Spanish startup has begun to pull back the curtain on the technology they’ve been developing for the better part of a decade. The company’s technology, which it calls Cloen Cordless Technology (CCT), is built around a dual induction plate system that provides heating to cook zones and wireless energy transmission to countertop appliances.

The company’s patented technology is on display in New York City at the flagship showroom of Spanish tile maker Porcelanosa. For Porcelanosa, another (and much older) company that also makes its home in the Valencian Community of Spain, Cloen built a custom-designed set of kitchen countertops and furniture with the CCT technology under the Spanish tile and furniture company’s Gamadecor brand.

You can watch a demo video of the CCT-powered Gamadecor product below:

Cloen Cordless Technology by Gadgets

In addition to building their own countertop kitchen products and those of partners (like Porcelanosa) with built-in transmission systems, Cloen is also working on a new line of countertop small appliances under the BeCordless brand, a joint venture between Cloen and cookware company Bergner. These countertop cooking appliances, which you can see in usage in the video above, include blenders, toasters, and air fryers.

The company is working with Porcelanosa on the cooking surface roadmap to build modular kitchen cooktops with up to five invisible cooking and power transmission zones. It also works with other manufacturers to build kitchen tables with dual-cooking and power transmission zones.

Above: Rendering of a 5 dual induction modular system being developed for 2025 release

The company has also worked with TV show producers in Spain and South Korea to build custom products for chef-centric cooking programs. In fact, you can see the Cloen-powered cooktop on Netflix in the reality TV show Lady Tamara, which is about Spanish aristocrat and chef Tamara Falcó.

For its product in Korea, the company is developing a table similar to the one in the IKEA concept video. However, if you expect to cook on a wood-only kitchen table, you might be slightly disappointed. According to Cloen, the table will have both power zones on the wood surface and induction heating in an in-laid glass area.

The company, which was founded by Pablo Cerra, an engineer by training, has grown to around 20 people, over half of them engineers. The focus on engineering is due to Cerra’s intention of building everything needed for the system. Cloen owns not only the core technology concepts but also develops the software and provides the SoC circuit boards to build into its partners’ systems.

“The secret is the software algorithm and the chip (microprocessor),” Cerra told The Spoon. “That’s secret to the whole technology.”

Cerra and his team decided to build a full-stack company to be an ingredient technology for their own and other brands’ wireless power kitchen technology because he felt the foundation needed to be laid for the market.

“This technology has to be for everyone,” Cerra said. “If you buy a mobile phone now, you can charge it with a normal charger or wireless charging. The thing is, wireless power and induction for the kitchen have to be the same.”

But Cloen isn’t alone. As mentioned, the Wireless Power Consortium is working on its Ki standard, and we’ve heard from multiple appliance brands that they are investigating and actively building products that will include wireless power. Other startups and tile companies are also looking at building wireless power systems.

Stepping back, the arrival of wireless power and invisible cooking zones is also part of a broader trend towards technology and functionality in the kitchen receding into the background. Sure, it’s part of the invisible kitchen design trend, but it’s also bigger than that, part of the megatrend that has technology disappearing before our eyes, fueled by AI, voice and gesture interface platforms, technology miniaturization, and the influence of companies like Apple and, well, IKEA over the past decade.

September 3, 2019

Wireless Power Consortium Announces Ki Standard for Cordless Kitchen Power

The Wireless Power Consortium (WPC) today announced that its wireless power standard for kitchen appliances will be called Ki (pronounced “key”).

Wireless power in the kitchen would deliver just that, the ability to run appliances like coffee makers and toasters without the use of cords. With the Ki system, power transmitters are hidden under countertops and up to 2.2kW of electricity is delivered when Ki-compatible devices are placed on top of them.

From the WPC press release:

The Ki Cordless Kitchen standard works with any non-metal countertop or table surface, including marble, slate, granite, laminates, wood and many others. Enabled appliances communicate with the transmitter through near-field communication (NFC), a safe, inexpensive and pervasive technology currently used around the world in bankcards, door locks, passports, transport tickets, and more.

For safety, power does not transmit when other objects like keys or phones are placed on top of charging areas. This means that when not in use for powering devices, Ki-enabled countertops can be used for food preparation or eating.

You can see Ki wireless power in action in this Wireless Power Consortium video:

WPC Ki Cordless Kitchen Video

If the name “Ki” looks/sounds familiar, that’s because the WPC had previously developed the Qi wireless standard for charging things like mobile phones. The Qi standard is now part of 4,500 certified products in use today.

The WPC isn’t the only company working on wireless power. Powercast uses radio frequencies to wirelessly charge and power devices over the air.

The WPC said that its Ki-powered cordless kitchen will be on display at its booth at the IFA show in Berlin this week.

If Berlin is too far, you will also be able to see Ki in action next month at the Smart Kitchen Summit.

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