
Energy harvester Dracula uses ambient light
Dracula Technologies SAS (Valence, France) has developed a system of powering electronics from levels of light found indoors.
The company was founded in 2012 and uses an organic photovoltaic (OPV) encapsulated film to deliver microwatts of power. The company has said an active area of 1.5 square centimeters can provide about 65 microwatts under 1,000 lux of LED indoor lighting. The small energy harvesting layers can generate electricity from ambient light as low as 50 lux, the intensity of light emitted by emergency exit panels.
The company said it plans to demonstrate an autonomous temperature logger, a CO2 sensor, an infrared sensor and a television remote control at CES in Las Vegas in January 2023.
“A minimum of 50 billion industrial IoT devices are expected to be deployed by 2025,” said Brice Cruchon, CEO, and founder of Dracula Technologies, in a statement. “The devices that are already deployed today consume too much energy and generate too much e-waste: 15 billion batteries are thrown away every year!”
Earlier in 2022 Dracula announced it had raised €5.5 million from backers including semiconductor manufacturer Semtech Corp. to build a factory in Valence. The company already has a production capacity of 15,000 modules per week. “Our goal is to reach 10 million modules per year by the end of next year,” said Cruchon, at the time. The company expects to triple sales revenue in 2022, to €3 million.
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