Battery Innovators Make Vermont a Hub in a Surging Industry

Tucked away in a modest office building in Shelburne, above a childcare center and down the hall from a massage therapist, a group of young engineers is trying to change the world.

Their company, Resonant Link, (a VTTA member) is developing wireless charging technologies that may someday revolutionize how people power up cars, medical devices and even robots.

In a nondescript conference room, chief technology officer Aaron Stein removed a thin, white doughnut-shaped coil from the center of one of the company’s charging units last week and proudly held it aloft.

“This is the magic inside,” he said.

The potent technology at the heart of Resonant Link’s charging devices was developed at Dartmouth College, the alma mater of Stein and the company’s three other founders. When they decided to hone the technology for commercial applications, the group could have set up shop in Boston or Silicon Valley. They instead chose to grow their startup in the fertile Champlain Valley, seeking to tap into the deep pool of talent in the state’s fast-growing battery technology industry.

From its roots powering antennas on remote mountaintops and scientific outposts in Antarctica, Vermont’s renewable energy industry has emerged as a hub of expertise and innovation in the dynamic energy storage industry.

Today, the state is home to a diverse ecosystem of companies competing and collaborating to meet the surging demand for battery storage systems that are transforming the transportation, renewable energy, health care and consumer products industries.

Read more in Seven Days.