Shares of long-term wireless charging company Energous nearly double today over years of rumors from Apple Partnership

Shares of Energous, a company that develops long-range RF-based charging technology under the name “WattUp”, nearly doubled today, apparently driven by a Bloomberg reported this morning indicating that Apple has been working on a MagSafe battery pack for its iPhone 12 series. The story kicked off earlier this week when MacRumors contributor Steve Moser discovers a non-specific reference to an iPhone “battery pack” in the latest beta of iOS 14.5.

According to a report this morning from CNA Finance, investors are betting on new rumors that Energous and Apple are collaborating on wireless charging, based on a “previously overlooked SEC filing.” The report was covered by several financial news outlets, including The street and Looking for Alpha.

Aside from the fact that Apple’s inductive MagSafe wireless charging depends on technology other than the RF system developed by Energous, there’s another problem with today’s rumor, and that is that the apparent calls “Apple compliance testing” for WattUp technology. back in 2013 and 2014 and was widely discussed in the media in 2016. The last time an Energious filing at the SEC mentioned Apple was in December 2014.

There was a wave of interest in Energous in 2016 and 2017 amid rumors of an Apple partnership, but speculation has quickly subsided and things have been quiet for several years now. Energous continued to develop its long-range charging technology, and worked with Dialog Semiconductor on the transmitter and receiver hardware, but has so far used it only in a few niche applications, such as horse health monitoring.