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frojack writes:

The Economist has a free article titled Coiled and ready to Strike which provides a summary of the state of wireless charging technologies.

From simple, but inefficient induction, to resonant induction, to lasers, many different avenues are being developed for charging different devices. There are efficiency problems with all of these.

Phones are the obvious target, with companies like McDonald's and Starbucks planning wireless charging stations in their restaurant tables. But other targets include electric cars, and buses, roadways, not to mention drones.

The story makes a good read to bring you up to speed without digging too deeply into the technical aspects of each method. Standardization seems the big problem, and even in the electronic device market there are competing non-inter-operable standards, being pushed. Oddly, the automotive industry may be closer to a standard than many.