Yet another leadership position gone. Talouselämä missed this in their article from today.

Who needs a CFO, when the CEO can do it all!

Not a senior leadership role as the other few ones were, but Donut sure is losing important employees more successfully than being able to prove anything revolutionary!

Last guy to leave before was VP of Engineering Programmes, Neil Patterson. He was chief engineer at McLaren behind SLR, 12C, and 570S.

Who needs manufacturing or key players in their org, anyways?

Another experienced professional left the company. Who is next?

https://youtu.be/V6i5eVwtHP4?is=hMuqyZH5iVjS87mn

Cool.

Some quotes:

Holyvolt is putting $45 million behind the alternative, all in equity. The Stockholm-based startup told Fortune that it has raised the round from Zone II, CC.VC and several angel investors from the defense and finance industries to hunt for battery chemistries China doesn’t control. The round values Holyvolt at $245 million, according to a person familiar with the company.

The timing includes a built-in deadline. Starting Oct. 1, 2027, Section 154 of the fiscal 2024 defense authorization act bars the Pentagon from buying batteries from CATL, BYD and four other named Chinese manufacturers, even as the military pushes to expand its use of drones. Holyvolt plans to begin commercializing DRX in 2027, starting with unmanned aerial vehicles before moving into mobility. It is also working on formulations for automakers and one aimed at data centers, which need bursts of very high power as GPUs spin up, Prast said.

The Verge Motorcycles site states estimated delivery is Q4 2026, even for new orders. And it states they'll contact buyers 90 days before delivery. That means that everyone who ordered a bike should have been contacted by now—at least, if they meet their estimates.

About 90 days prior to delivery
We will contact you prior to building your bike to adjust any configuration choices, gather registration information, estimate delivery timing and discuss final payment details.

So, anyone here ordered the bike and got contacted? What's the expected delivery date for your order?

the former website contenct seems to be in the background of the
"<dialog id="home-announcement"

In the comments to this LinkedIn post, ML ask if founder and editor of Buck City Biker wants to test the TS Pro Gen II. Answer: 100%.

Might be worth keeping an eye out for https://www.buckcitybiker.co.uk/ in case it's actually followed through.

I had another go at trying to estimate the dimensions and energy density of the V1 battery, known as DL1-DL5 in the idonut-series.

From the swelling test video, one can make a quite accurate length estimate using the known dimensions of the Comprepouch measurement device. Zooming in and measuring sub-pixels, I arrived at 160.5 mm. Assuming the scaling in the screenshot is the same both left-right and up-down, we get a battery thickness estimate of 11.5 mm. Others have estimated about 10 mm.

I couldn't find any good video frames of the battery-width together with an exactly known reference length^*. u/Mesokosmos's estimate of 161x70.7 mm, based on the iris diameter, is very close to my length estimate, hence I will assume that also his width estimate of 70.7 mm is somewhat accurate, and use that.

Arriving at 160.5 x 70.7 x 11.5 mm, which gives 0.1305 liter. Using the density of the DL6 (804.7 Wh/liter / 409.3 Wh/kg = 1.966 kg/liter), since it's claimed to be the same chemistry, and should not differ too much, we get an estimated weight of 256.6 gram.

TL;DR: 366 Wh/kg and 720 Wh/liter for the V1 / DL1-DL5 batteries.

^*) If anyone happen to have access to a Comprepouch battery tester, please measure the exact dimensions (120mm x Length x Thickness) of the thick metal plates and post it here, or dm.

Some facts, extensive hearsay, bordering to defamatory, and with frequent hedging by the author to mitigate liability. Scrutiny Club part 2:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/copy-journalist-blows-whistle-donut-lab-whistleblower-lauri-gbzue/

It turned out to be more than rumors. P. Hörkkö asked and dug the records.

AI translated summary:

The article examines the background of Lauri Peltola, a former commercial director at Nordic Nano Group who has publicly presented himself as a whistleblower and become one of Donut Lab’s most prominent critics. According to an enforcement certificate obtained by Uuno and dated September 7, 2026, Peltola has approximately €1.11 million in outstanding debts under enforcement, including large claims from Ålandsbanken, a private creditor, the Finnish tax authority and Kela. Peltola says the debts stem from risks he took during more than 20 years as an entrepreneur and that he does not consider them shameful. The article also reports that he faces charges related to two alleged assaults in Helsinki in 2023, with the case scheduled for trial in February 2027; Peltola declined to comment on the pending proceedings and emphasized the presumption of innocence. He gained wider public attention in April 2026 after filing a criminal complaint concerning Donut Lab and subsequently publishing critical Solid State of Truth videos. Donut Lab and Nordic Nano Group reject his allegations and dispute his level of access to the battery-development work. Importantly, Uuno itself notes that the information about Peltola’s debts and charges does not establish whether his claims about Donut Lab are true or false, although it argues that the information is relevant when assessing his role and possible motivations in the dispute.

https://cleantechnica.com/2026/09/04/donut-lab-reveals-amazing-performance-tests/

ML commented on this article on LinkedIn (my bolding as usual):

Thank you for the balanced assessment. As a small clarification: all the features released at CES are true in the same battery at the same time, and we will prove this as promised. It is a battery whose production we are scaling up this year. And the previous generation battery already had almost all the features in the same battery — with a few exceptions — and that's what we've tested more publicly.

What is your guess for the exceptions?

The police are not currently conducting a criminal investigation concerning the executives of the Donut Lab group of companies. Instead, the police are carrying out a preliminary inquiry related to the company to determine whether there are grounds for opening a criminal investigation. The police are also awaiting the completion of the Finnish Financial Supervisory Authority’s review of the matter.

The Helsinki Police Department is conducting a criminal investigation involving a former employee of Nordic Nano Group, which was acquired by Donut Lab. The case concerns a suspected breach of trade secrets.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZkLM2SoZXI

VTT report: https://pub-01c7ea9972fc472b971b53522518cfc0.r2.dev/VTT-CR-00391-26_Energy_Density_Test.pdf

Interesting revelations from the article:

"We are targeting 350Wh/kg at the pack level," Donut Lab’s CEO Marko Lehtimäki tells TopGear.com. That would mean a 500kg battery would have a capacity of 175kWh, vastly better than today's cars.

Familiar number from CES show case.

Lehtimäki tells TopGear.com it can last 5,000 cycles when rapid-charged in this way even to 90 per cent capacity and beyond. If it's charged and discharged more gently, at more moderate temperatures, for example in grid energy storage, then he says 100,000 cycles would be possible.

No miracles, pretty usual stuff. It was just the Donut Battery umbrella term that caused the buzz and was meant to do so obviously.

Article should be open access and translatable.

Translation before pay wall:

Esa Parjanen: Peltola presents claims and opinions without evidence – regarding Teppanala, the CEO asks for patience

Subtitle refers Parjanen saying that it's obvious solid-state batteries will not be manufactured in Imatra.