NATO funds portable charging technology for Arctic deployment

NATO’s Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic (DIANA) recently selected the Canadian company Quaze Technologies to develop an enabling portable, resilient wireless charging solution for drones and unmanned systems to be used in extreme cold environments.

The company was among the winners of the 2025 Arctic Innovation Mobilisation (AIM) competition. It is follow-on activity from the Arctic Warrior Experiment (AWE), which was a technical experimentation event held in Norway, aimed at testing cold-weather gear and other technologies in Arctic conditions.

The 2025 AIM will provide Quaze with €50,000 (US$56,100) to continue to develop, test and refine its solution. Speaking to Shephard, Francis Roy, President and CSO of Quaze, stated that the technology the company is developing can recharge “just about anything”, eliminating “the need to carry a whole lot of batteries or separate charging cables”.

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“We are killing the burden of connecting a wire to the system to recharge,” he explained. “What the military needs is an agnostic technology that can recharge any unmanned systems without human intervention in the most hostile environment.”

The supplier offered its Surface Power Technology to the DIANA competition. The solution has been engineered to enable easy and reliable wireless transmission of energy anywhere on Earth or in space.

The solution is mounted on the equipment that will provide power, such as a car, and turns large surfaces without physical constraint into hubs of wireless for seamless power transmission.

It is powered by magnetic resonance and is scalable to suit various applications, and simultaneously charges multiple devices.

“Right now, it is able to push all the way up to 100 watts. Then anything, no size restriction, can come and grab that power,” Roy remarked.

He explained that it works even in the presence of debris between the transmitter and the receiver. “It is a very resilient system that the operator can rely on and maximise the value of their unmanned systems.”

The technology was on display at the SOF Week 2025 exhibition in Tampa, Florida. On the show floor, the supplier demonstrated its ability to wirelessly recharge equipment for dismounted soldiers.