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Solving the Microbattery Industry’s Toughest Technological Challenges

Ensurge has applied an ultrathin 10 µm stainless steel substrate, innovative core-cell stacking and packaging, Roll-to-Roll processing and materials innovations to a proven and established solid-state chemistry to achieve the powerful, durable, and reliable Ensurge Microbattery.

Innovative Microbattery Architecture

Ultra-thin 10 µm Stainless Steel Substrate

Ultra-thin 10 µm Stainless Steel Substrate

  • High energy density
  • High mechanical strength
Roll-to-Roll Manufacturing Facility

Roll-to-Roll Manufacturing Facility

  • High throughput, low cost
  • Customizable form factor
  • Conventional manufacturing environment
Established Anode-less Solid-State Chemistry

Established Anode-less Solid-State Chemistry

  • 1,000+ cycles
  • Fast charging and high pulse discharge
Innovative Cell-stacking & Packaging

Innovative Cell-stacking & Packaging

  • High energy density
  • Customizable form factor
  • Contacts for direct Printed Circuit Board (PCB) assembly
Ultra-thin 10 µm Stainless Steel Substrate at Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Ultra-thin 10 µm Stainless Steel Substrate

The Ensurge Microbattery's 10 µm stainless steel substrate is a significant contributor to Volumetric Energy Density (VED) that is orders of magnitude better than competitive alternatives that use much thicker ceramic and silicon substrates. Stainless steel offers additional benefits as it is a natural conductor and moisture barrier and offers high mechanical strength, further enhancing the Ensurge Microbattery's performance and reliability.
Roll-to-Roll Manufacturing Facility at Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Roll-to-Roll Manufacturing Facility

The Ensurge Microbattery is manufactured at Ensurge's own state-of-the-art Roll-to-Roll production facility located in Silicon Valley. Roll-to-Roll processing is more efficient and scalable, and inherently leads to higher throughput and lower cost within a conventional manufacturing environment that does not need stringent humidity and air controls.
Established Anode-less Solid-State Chemistry at Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Established Anode-less Solid-State Chemistry

The Ensurge Microbattery is based on an established and proven anode-less solid-state lithium chemistry accelerating Ensurge's engineering development. The anode-less architecture allows Ensurge to use a much simpler manufacturing environment. Ensurge has innovated within this chemistry with new materials and packaging that deliver high Volumetric Energy Density (VED), fast charging and high-pulse discharge.
Innovative Cell-stacking & Packaging at Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Innovative Cell-stacking & Packaging

Precise and efficient semiconductor tools and processes are used to create ultra-compact stacked and packaged Ensurge Microbatteries. This approach maximizes the Volumetric Energy Density (VED) of the Ensurge Microbattery while ensuring high performance, customizable form factors and the ability to provision contacts for direct PCB connection.

Ensurge Solid-state Lithium Battery Technology

Making Anode-less Work in Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Making Anode-less Work

Anode-less solid-state lithium chemistry has been around for decades but has failed to achieve its full potential in terms of capacities and manufacturing at scale. Ensurge engineering team addressed several critical interfacial engineering challenges through packaging innovation to deliver 1 mAh to 100 mAh capacity microbattery in high volume.
10 µm Stainless Steel Substrate at Ensurge Inc, San Jose

10 µm Stainless Steel Substrate

Substrates do not contribute to energy while adding volume reducing possible energy density. Hence it is critical to minimize the substrate thickness. Ensurge worked through several challenges through fundamental innovations in using 10 µm (micron) stainless steel as the substrate in the Roll-to-Roll processing facility. Stainless steel brought additional benefits as a conductor and hence obviating the need for a separate cathode current collector. Finally, stainless steel also provides a natural moisture barrier reducing additional materials.
Interfacial Engineering in Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Interfacial Engineering

At a simplistic level, Ensurge microbattery consists of cathode and electrolyte materials deposited on the 10 µm stainless steel substrate followed by anode current collector and an overlay. However, Ensurge's breakthroughs in interfacial engineering, engineering of the interfaces between these layers, have been critical to achieving low impedance unit cells that achieve the target performance including capacity and cycling.
Stacking & Packaging at Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Stacking & Packaging

Just like the substrate, stacking and packaging do not contribute to energy while adding volume. Each rectangular unit cell is a small battery with anode on one side and cathode on the other. Ensurge stacks multiple unit cells carefully connecting all the anodes and cathodes into a single anode and cathode connector. Battery must be packaged to ensure that no air or moisture can get inside. This complex technology uses repurposed semiconductor tools and processes reflecting many fundamental Ensurge innovations leading to higher volumetric energy density (VED) with a battery that can be surface mounted on a PCB.
Ensurge Solid-State Lithium Technology vs. Lithium Ion (Li-ion) at Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Ensurge Solid-State Lithium Technology vs. Lithium Ion (Li-ion)

The biggest difference between the batteries is that Ensurge's technology uses a solid electrolyte vs. a liquid one in Lithium ion (Li-ion).

Ensurge solid-state technology also charges three times faster, has more than twice the cycle life, supports multiple times pulse current and supports flexible form factors.

Ensurge Solid-State Lithium Technology vs. Lithium Polymer (Li-poly) at Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Ensurge Solid-State Lithium Technology vs. Lithium Polymer (Li-poly)

Lithium Polymer (Li-poly) technology is similar to Li-ion except it uses a gel-like material for the electrolyte vs. liquid electrolyte used by Li-ion. Ensurge solid-state lithium technology provides for 4x or more energy density advantage vs. Li-poly especially high in small form factor, 1 mAh to 100 mAh capacities. Other advantages include faster charging, high pulse current and higher cycle life.
Ensurge vs. Other Solid-State Chemistry at Ensurge Inc, San Jose

Ensurge vs. Other Solid-State Chemistry

One key difference is the use of 10 µm stainless steel substrate vs. ceramic and silica used by the competitors that are 100's of microns thick. As a result, their energy density is orders of magnitude lower and they are only able to provide batteries with few hundred µAh capacity that has very limited target applications. Ensurge solid-state lithium technology with much higher energy density is able to deliver 1 mAh to 100 mAh capacities that will enable wearables, hearables and IoT connected devices to really take off.

Learn how Ensurge Microbattery can energize innovation in your most challenging designs