A popular YouTube channel just took apart one of the battery industry's bigger claims.
Ryan Inis Hughes, who runs the Ziroth channel, published an investigation concluding that Donut Lab's solid-state battery, marketed as ready for mass production, is a conventional lithium-ion cell. Hughes described the gap as deliberate deception, not an honest mistake. His case drew on testimony from Lauri Peltola, the former Chief Commercial Officer of Nordic Nano Group, the manufacturer Donut Lab had named as its production partner. Hughes also cited more than 20 independent battery experts, including Julian Zahnow.
Solid-state batteries have been the "almost there" promise of the EV and consumer-electronics industries for years. When a startup claims to have cracked mass production, capital moves. If the allegations hold, the damage runs two ways: investors who backed Donut Lab, and the broader field of researchers doing real work on solid-state chemistry who now share a headline with a fraud.
Donut Lab is not the first energy startup to discover that bold claims outlast the chemistry. It probably will not be the last.