When we hear about smartphone advancements, usually it revolves around cramming more pixels onto our screens or beefing up our devices with even more powerful processors. Yet in this move to take everything mobile, where are the bigger batteries?

Dyson, the company that makes that cool-looking fan you picked up the other day, wants to help change things. The hand dryer-producer has invested $15 million in Sakti3, a Michigan-based company whose battery technology potentially has a higher energy density than the Lithium ion batteries powering our smartphones and Dyson's handheld vacuums.

No, it doesn't run Android. Yes, it's still relevant. Stay with me here.

Sakti3's batteries use solid lithium electrodes, which it says are capable of storing more energy in smaller spaces than the liquid-based lithium-ion batteries we've all grown accustomed to. Most importantly, the company says its technology is cheap and easily manufactured.

Dyson's currently measures the battery life of its handheld vacuums in minutes, not hours, so the company obviously has incentive to see things improve.* And if Sakti3's technology catches on, we could potentially see it picked up by anyone else looking to extend battery life without exploding manufacturing costs. Prohibitive expenses have often been the reason battery advancements don't catch on, and Sakti3's goal is to change this for all industries that rely heavily on batteries, from phones and tablets to cars and, yes, vacuums.

*Though how much time do you really need to clean behind the cabinets?

Source: Technology Review,TechCrunch