[perching_aix]

Saw this yesterday, did not expect the competition around Donut's batteries to heat up this much and this quickly.

Even the gravimetric density is fairly close, CATL's claim is 350 Wh/kg, compared to Donut's 400 Wh/kg.

The safety and durability (plus no lithium) prospects of Donut's V1 battery are still big though (if the thing is actually real).

[bayesianbot]

Feels quite clear Donut doesn't have much - no meaningful new tests released for many weeks already and some executive of Nordic Nano sued Donut Lab and said their claims were misleading.

I haven't really followed that closely myself, but I've noticed the people who I saw defending Donut before have gone really quiet about it lately.

[audunw]

I find the talk around Donut so weird. At CES we were told they had nothing because they hadn’t shared third party test. They then shared third party tests remarkably fast. From the dating of VTT reports it’s clear they shared it as soon as VTT finalised their reports. Now they have nothing because they haven’t released enough tests fast enough?

It’s clear they have something very interesting.

We’re mainly missing low temp and energy density test. If they have something real, obviously they’re saving density for last (near the time real customers get their hand on the bike), since it will give them huge amount of attention. Can’t fault them for milking what they’ve got (if they got it) for all the marketing hype it’s worth.

We’re also missing cycle life test but the claims can’t really be fully tested in a reasonable time. So even if their tests show projections that indicate high cycle life, people will doubt it, or shift the focus to ageing effects. So personally I don’t care much, we just have to see how it works out in real life.

The lawsuit incidentally reveal their connection to partners which does reveal that there’s something real there. Another criticism was that the couldn’t have developed all the tech from scratch themselves in such a short time, and now it’s clear they didn’t, they’re using tech licensed by other companies with real competence in the field.

If it’s as good as they say with zero caveats and can be manufactured at scale is another matter

[perching_aix]

I think by this point they demonstrated basically all the characteristics of their battery well enough, except for the density, but then that was a pretty damn important and big claim. I'm not sure they can afford to delay that much longer. Or the actual shipment of products.

[crote]

They didn't share third party tests. They shared tests done by a party they contracted, and whose test reports don't back up the claims to the extent that they claimed.

Do they have something interesting? Maybe! But it could also be yet another Theranos. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and they haven't exactly been forthcoming with it.

[pjc50]

It seems clear to me that Donut are a vaporware company with hardly any customers, and CATL are the largest battery company in the world.

[yorwba]

Donut's website claims that they will release the next test result in 7 days, so you can check next week whether those people will have something new to talk about: https://idonutbelieve.com

[jonkoops]

I sincerely hope Donut really has an ace up their sleeve, we could really use some domestic competition against China here in the EU. I sincerely hope that the next update from them is something solid (pun intended), and not 'what color is the battery'.

[cmrdporcupine]

Feels weird to pollute a thread about the progress of the largest battery manufacturer in the world that does real science and engineering and massive industrial installations... with a comment about an almost certainly fraudulent fly-by-night company making tiny batteries for motorbikes and not providing real science or published papers to back up their extraordinary claims.

[perching_aix]

Please do exercise the downvote and flag buttons in that case, instead of polluting the thread with a performative tirade like this. Seems weird that you'd use this as an opportunity to rehash blatantly obvious talking points others have already brought up here before you, if it really does merely just bother you that this is what the respective reputations are and that they're being brought into comparison regardless. It comes across as an attempt to discredit and mock rather than as a genuine upset.

See, I can do this too. All it takes is a modicum amount of conspiratorial thinking and some willingness to engage in ill faith, with a dash of flair for the dramatic. For normal people, it was instead just "oh yeah, news cycle thing one vs news cycle thing two".