Productive Product: Maxwell Technologies [1] is working with China's Lishen Battery [2] to design hybrid lithium-ultracapacitor products [3], Maxwell officials said today. Immediately, Lishen will start making lithium cells adjacent to ultracapacitors in the same package, while preparing to merge lithium with ultracapacitors in individual hybrid cells by summer 2009. Lishen plans to use the cells in electric vehicles in China, although the deal is non-exclusive, leaving Maxwell free to sign up other partners worldwide. As for the reliability of such devices, particularly the lithium aspect, a technology which produced some notorious fires [4] in Sony-powered portable computers: "We're not going to try to either knock or defend the application of lithiums in vehicles. It's something that needs to be addressed, of course," Maxwell representative Michael Sund noted. Here in The Efficiency Zone, we just hope the term "burst" technology is not taken too literally.