86: A Hard Cell: Engineering Ultra-Narrow Batteries for AI Glasses

Your smart glasses run all day on a battery narrower than your pinky finger and building it required reinventing how batteries are made. In this episode, Pascal talks to Karthik and Myuran, the engineers behind Meta's steel can battery technology, to explore why traditional pouch cells couldn't cut it for the ultra-slim temple arms of AI glasses like Meta Ray-Bans and the Oakley Vanguards. Tune in to learn how Meta designed, built, and scaled the batteries powering your glasses, wristbands, and cases from first prototype to mass production.

Got feedback? Send it to us on Threads (https://threads.net/@metatechpod), Instagram (https://instagram.com/metatechpod) and don't forget to follow our host Pascal (https://mastodon.social/@passy, https://threads.net/@passy_). Fancy working with us? Check out https://www.metacareers.com/.

Links

SilverTorch: Index as Model — A New Retrieval Paradigm for Recommendation Systems - https://engineering.fb.com/2026/05/26/ml-applications/silvertorch-index-as-model-new-retrieval-paradigm-recommendation-systems/

Timestamps

Intro and News 0:06
Guest intros 1:49
The problem with existing batteries 4:16
Pouch vs Steel Can Batteries 6:40
What does lower impedence mean? 10:27
Power requirements 12:25
Synchronising two batteries 16:02
Manufacturing never-done-before batteries 23:11
Software vs hardware iteration cycles 28:12
Collaborations across the globe 30:51
Market compliance 37:00
Outro 42:24

Det här avsnittet är hämtat från ett öppet RSS-flöde och publiceras inte av Podme. Det kan innehålla reklam.

Avsnitt(94)

BONUS: Send Us Your Questions About Engineering at Meta

Pascal is going on Recharge for August so there will be no regular interview episode. However, we want to hear your questions for our mailbag episode. Send them to us on Instagram (https://www.instagr...

29 Juli 1min

87: Everything is Power: Battery Life Engineering for AI Glasses

What changes for you as a developer when the device moves from your pocket to your face? The battery shrinks by an order of magnitude, the thermal budget is whatever won't make your nose uncomfortable...

13 Juli 41min

85: Reel Friends: Building Social Discovery that Scales to Billions

You've probably spotted those little circles of your friends' faces popping up on Facebook Reels. They look simple enough, but building them was a proper engineering challenge. In this episode, Pascal...

8 Maj 38min

84: Trust But Canary: Configuration Safety at Scale

Have you ever wondered how Meta makes config rollouts safe at scale? In this episode, Pascal sits down with Ishwari and Joe to discuss Meta's approach for propagating changes across services in second...

2 Apr 37min

83: Patch Me If You Can: AI Codemods for Secure-by-Default Android Apps

At Meta, even seemingly simple engineering tasks—like updating an API—become monumental undertakings when you're dealing with millions of lines of code and thousands of engineers, especially if the ch...

27 Feb 47min

82: CSS at Scale with StyleX

It's not just Not Invented Here Syndrome. Some technologies like CSS simply don't scale if you're building some of the largest websites on the planet with thousands of engineers committing to the same...

8 Jan 44min

81: From Zero to Polish: Building Meta Ray-Ban Display

You've likely heard of Meta Ray-Ban Display by now — but what's it actually like to work on it? In this episode, Pascal talks to Kenan and Emanuel about the exciting features of Meta's First-Gen Displ...

12 Dec 202547min