Whatever Happened To nPower PEG After Shark Tank?

Science and "Shark Tank" don't always collide, but when they do, wonderful things can happen — albeit only for a lucky chosen few. See the example of Aaron Lemieux (no relation to this writer), inventor of the nPower PEG, whose company didn't land a deal from the Sharks — and whose products are sadly no longer being manufactured. Tremont Electronics' website has not been updated in years, its Twitter hasn't been updated since 2013 – which isn't long after Lemieux appeared on "Shark Tank" — and a post on Shark Tank Blog indicates that the company closed in 2016. It reports Lemieux has returned to his day job as a paramedic.

Lemieux's invention, the nPower PEG, was a battery charger powered by a person's kinetic energy. Simply walking about and doing any form of exercise charges the battery up. At the time of the pitch, Lemieux boasted two awards for his innovation and hoped to take his invention to a wider audience. But the gadget was a victim of its own innovation — it depends upon how much kinetic energy the user can build up. Ergo, if you're not an athlete, it won't do you much good; Wired reported in 2012 that it took their reviewer 25 minutes of walking to get a single bar of energy on their depleted phone. That means charging up larger objects proved to be nigh on impossible unless you could build up a lot of kinetic energy.

Aaron Lemieux's "Shark Tank" appearance ultimately didn't win him favor with the sharks. Between the high amount of money he requested from them, the fact that they didn't agree that the nPower PEG was any more environmentally friendly than solar or wind power, and the fact that they felt he was selling them a proof of concept instead of a product, most of the Sharks were out pretty early. Ultimately, none of them bit, stating that they felt Lemieux was brilliant and had interesting ideas about environmental stability, but had no single-minded concept for the product's success. 

Middling reviews for the product during its short time in the marketplace also likely affected the product's sales power. Wired only gave the nPower PEG a 5 out of 10; before it ceased production, Amazon customer reviews froze at a 3.5 out of 5. The Wired review made note of the inefficiency of its battery, which did not output enough energy to power up a laptop. While this makes Tremont Electronics one of those companies that no longer exist in spite of their "Shark Tank" presence, there's still hope that Lemieux will find an outlet for his unique inventions.