Whatever you think about Donut Lab’s battery, the panic button has been pressed in China

Solid-state battery innovations have popped up in the public eye at regular intervals. The formula is usually familiar: Company X says that we are developing this revolutionary battery technology and it will be in production within a couple of years. After a couple of years, either the topic has been ditched, or the schedule has been postponed again by a couple of years.

Over the years, similar cases have accumulated so much that the media following the industry could hardly stand their jaws open to the new solid state battery announcements.

This was the case until January 5, 2026, when a small Finnish start-up announced a solid-state battery that shook the world and had completely superior specs. In this post, I’m not going to go into more detail about whether Donut Lab’s battery announcement is true or not.

An ingenious marketing trick in the battery industry

Donut Lab can really be credited with the fact that the Finnish company’s battery publication raised the interest of the entire battery industry to a whole new level.

In general, no announcements related to battery innovations exceed the national news threshold in Finland. Donut Lab has done it repeatedly, and surely the news threshold will be crossed in the future.

The world is also interested in Donut Lab, but more within the industry. Videos about the topic on YouTube have gathered millions of viewers at best.

Something about the tidal wave caused by the announcement is also said by the fact that the Chinese battery giant Turn the CEO wanted to publicly knock out Donut Lab’s battery. This also brought additional publicity to the Finnish start-up and the entire battery industry.

Hey, us too!

At the time of writing, a good three weeks have passed since Donut Lab’s battery release. Since then, battery announcements have started to trickle down from global battery players at a surprisingly fast pace.

Geely: Volvo’s parent company announced on 23.1. to start production of solid-state batteries during 2026.

Chery: Told 19.1. to bring to the market a production car made with solid-state batteries, capable of a range of up to 1,500 kilometers.

Dongfeng: Said that he will start cold testing of his own solid electrolyte battery on 14.1. The battery has an energy density of 350 Wh/kg, and it is promised to enable a range of more than 1,000 km for electric cars.

Hongqi: Hongqi, who belongs to FAW-Group, said on 21.1. to start testing its own solid electrolyte battery.

Quantum Scape: The stock of the company with an American background, but which develops a solid-state battery for Volkswagen, bounced after the announcement of Donut Lab.

Svolt: The Chinese company that most strongly criticized Donut Lab’s battery separately mentioned a Finnish start-up at its own battery technology conference. Semi-solid state batteries are coming from the company very soon.

Speed ​​to development work?

Although Donut Lab never became anything, it has already put solid state batteries in the spotlight. I personally at least hope that a real breakthrough in this field of technology will come sooner rather than later.

Source: CarNewsChina

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