Walk through any Indian office at 4 pm and count the laptops. Most are plugged in, sitting at 100%, warm from a full day of video calls. For a lithium-ion battery, that is close to the worst place to be.

Chennai-based Hivericks Technologies has spent eight years building a fix. Its product, XOPTIMUS, is a smart battery charging system that pairs a patented plug-in hardware unit with an app that learns how you use your device. The app then decides when power should flow and when it should stop.

It sounds like a small problem. It isn’t.

Why conventional charging wears batteries out early

Phone and laptop chargers are built for one goal: maximum runtime. Most push lithium-ion cells to 4.20 volts per cell, the ceiling. The battery pays for it.

According to Battery University, a cell held at full charge at 25°C keeps roughly 80% of its capacity after a year. Store the same cell at 40% charge and it keeps about 96%. Push the temperature to 40°C, which a laptop on a desk in a Chennai summer can easily hit, and the fully charged cell drops to around 65%.

The same research shows that every 0.10V reduction in peak charge voltage roughly doubles cycle life. A cell charged to 4.20V typically delivers 300 to 500 cycles. Charge it a little lower and that number climbs fast.

The charger knows none of this. It doesn’t know you’ll be on wall power for ten hours, or that your phone is cooking on a car dashboard. It just fills the tank. That blind spot is the opening for smart battery charging.

How XOPTIMUS smart battery charging works

Hivericks’ answer has two parts. The first is hardware. The flagship XOPTIMUS Wall Adapter sits between the socket and the charger you already own, so it can physically cut or restore power. A USB adapter with USB-C output and Charge2Go, a unit for 12V vehicle sockets, are open for pre-booking.

The second part is software. The XOPTIMUS app reads battery temperature, charge level, charging history and usage patterns, then pairs with the hardware over Bluetooth. It currently runs on Android, Windows, macOS and Ubuntu, with iOS support in development.

The intelligence sits in how the two talk to each other. A product manager who keeps her laptop docked all day needs the battery parked at a moderate level. A delivery rider whose phone drains by noon needs a full charge, delivered without overheating. XOPTIMUS builds a charging profile for each pattern, and users can override it when they know a long day is coming.

Why hardware, when phones already cap charging?

This is the question every investor will ask. Apple, Samsung and several laptop makers now ship built-in charge limits.

Those limits are fixed thresholds locked to one brand and, usually, to newer models. XOPTIMUS brings smart battery charging to any brand and to devices people already own. For a company running 500 laptops from three manufacturers, that difference matters. One control layer across a mixed fleet beats chasing settings in three different vendor apps.

The e-waste math behind the pitch

The sustainability case is where smart battery charging stops being a gadget story.

The UN’s Global E-waste Monitor 2024 found the world generated a record 62 million tonnes of e-waste in 2022, up 82% from 2010. Only 22.3% was formally collected and recycled. The total is on track to hit 82 million tonnes by 2030.

When a battery fades, the whole device often gets replaced with it. Extending battery life at the charging stage attacks the problem upstream, before anything reaches a landfill. Hivericks says its approach can cut an individual’s charging-related carbon footprint by 38%. That is a company figure, not an independent audit, and the startup would strengthen its case by publishing third-party lifespan data.

The team and the road so far

Hivericks was incorporated in August 2018 by Arun Natesan (CEO), Govindharaj Ashok (CSO) and Hemalatha R. Arun and Govind have been friends since college. The team’s work spans embedded electronics, IoT, cloud software and hardware certification.

The capital so far has come from India’s incubator network. Dealroom lists a seed round of about ₹50 lakh from Gyan Circle Ventures, AIC T-Hub, AIC Raise, HexGn and AIC Sangam. In 2021, the company received a ₹7 lakh grant under MeitY’s TIDE 2.0 scheme through IIIT Sri City, as The Hindu reported. CB Insights lists IITM Pravartak Technologies Foundation, linked to IIT Madras, as a more recent backer.

Recognition followed. Hivericks finished in the top five of the Chennai-Next Startup Challenge 2018-19, won the Future Impact Startup award at the Tamil Nadu Enclave in 2021, and was among the winners at Propel Pitchfest22 at BML Munjal University.

The founders are candid about early mistakes. In a 2020 HexGn profile, co-founder Hemalatha said the team took on client projects to fund its prototype instead of chasing grants, and skipped early market feedback. The result was several prototype rounds before reaching a sellable MVP. Hardware founders will recognise that trap.

What investors and founders should watch

The strongest wedge, in my read, is the enterprise fleet. Offices keep laptops plugged in all day, replace them on fixed cycles, and increasingly report on e-waste and energy use. A smart battery charging tool that stretches a device refresh cycle by even a year has a clean ROI story for an IT head.

Mobility is the second bet. India’s gig workforce runs on smartphones charged from bike and car sockets, often in heat that punishes batteries.

The risks are real. OEM charge caps will keep improving, which squeezes the consumer case. Hardware brings certification costs and thinner margins than software. And the company needs published longevity numbers to turn a strong thesis into a closed enterprise deal.

The bigger bet: chargers as an intelligence layer

Battery-powered devices are multiplying across phones, laptops, wearables and two-wheelers. The charger has barely changed in that time. XOPTIMUS is betting that the next upgrade won’t come from bigger batteries but from smarter decisions about how they’re filled.

If Hivericks proves that smart battery charging holds up at fleet scale with hard data, the charger stops being an accessory and becomes infrastructure.

Frequently asked questions

What is XOPTIMUS?

XOPTIMUS is a smart battery charging system from Chennai-based Hivericks Technologies. It combines plug-in charging hardware with an app that tracks battery temperature, charge level and usage to decide when a phone or laptop should charge.

Who founded Hivericks Technologies?

Hivericks was founded in 2018 by Arun Natesan, Govindharaj Ashok and Hemalatha R. Arun Natesan serves as CEO.

Does smart battery charging extend battery life?

Battery research shows lithium-ion cells age faster when held at full charge and high temperature. Smart battery charging reduces time spent in that state, which slows capacity loss.

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