Next-Gen Battery Developer Ionic Materials Closes Down
Company said it had developed a novel polymer that would enable batteries using lithium metal.
In another setback for a maker of a next-generation electric vehicle battery, Massachusetts battery developer Ionic Materials let go virtually its entire workforce on Tuesday, closed down and made plans to sell its equipment and other assets, according to multiple former employees. The company fired more than 40 employees, two of whom said they received two weeks of pay as severance.
Ionic attracted investor attention in 2018, claiming it had invented a novel polymer material that solved some of battery science’s most vexing problems with lithium metal, an exceptionally energy-dense material that—if it worked—could deliver long driving range. That year, Ionic raised $65 million in a Series C round—large by the standards of the time— from investors including Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi.