Apple fans are mocking the big US tech Company after they finally admitted that they have pulled the plug on their AirPower wireless charging mat.
Claiming that it wouldn’t meet Apple’s ‘high standards,’ the company confirmed that AirPower had bitten the dust within minutes of the announcement the Twitter feeds followed.
The firm had said the AirPower would ship in 2018 but gave no updates for roughly 18 months.
The comments on Twitter mocked Apple with one Twitter using claiming that he bought a $10 wireless charger and it worked but Apple it appears sees wireless charging as a tough engineering problem.
‘RIP AirPower. What a black eye for Apple’s hardware folks, and for Apple’s wireless charging strategy in general,’ coder Steve Troughton-Smith tweeted.
‘Impossible to believe Apple legitimately couldn’t ship a Qi charger with multiple coils. You can buy three third-party chargers and sit them side by side just fine.’
Neil Cybart, a long-time Apple analyst, added: ‘The problem with AirPower wasn’t that it was announced before it was 100% ready to go. iPhone anyone?
‘Instead, the problem was Apple couldn’t overcome the barriers that ultimately prevented a successful launch,’ he said.
It’s not a great look for Apple’s hardware division, which has experienced a few missteps in recent months.
Apple has yet to fix a persistent flaw in the butterfly keyboards on Mac computers they have also canned the launch of its AirPods headphones, as well as the HomePod voice-activated speaker.
AirPower is based on the Qi charging standard, which powers wireless chargers for Android and iOS smartphones alike.
It was first announced in September 2017.
However, Apple claimed to have added a number of software features to improve the wireless charging experience when used with its iPhone and Watch products.
The iPhone maker claimed that AirPower struggled to communicate with corresponding iOS devices, which meant that it couldn’t accurately predict what the charge levels are for those items.
AirPower was expected to include a custom Apple chip that runs a stripped-down version of the iOS operating system to conduct on-device power management and pairing with devices that are placed on the charging mat.
‘After much effort, we’ve concluded AirPower will not achieve our high standards and we have cancelled the project,’ Dan Riccio, Apple’s senior vice president of hardware engineering, told TechCrunch.
‘We apologize to those customers who were looking forward to this launch.
We continue to believe that the future is wireless and are committed to push the wireless experience forward,’ he added.
Reports have it that Apple encountered repeated issues with heat management and charging speed, as well as charging interference.
