In a global race to get solid-state batteries on the road, few would bet on two tiny companies in Estonia, known for their innovative hubless, in-wheel electric motors and motorcycles. Yet these upstarts have apparently done what Tesla, BYD and other EV-and-battery titans have been unable to do.
To be fair, building a relative handful of batteries for a low-volume motorcycle is a whole different ballgame from, say, Toyota having to validate and stand behind thousands or millions of car batteries under warranty. Nevertheless, Verge Motorcycles and its tech spin-off, Donut Lab, are claiming a checkered flag at CES 2026 in Las Vegas: The Verge TS Pro motorcycle will begin shipping with Donut Lab’s solid-state batteries in the first quarter of this year, founders of the two companies told IEEE Spectrum. All other Verge bikes will follow with their own solid-state packs, to be built in Finland, just across the Gulf of Finland from Estonia.
Short riding range and frequent, lengthy charging stops have been big bummers for electric motorcycles. Their whispery hum may be welcome while pulling into a quiet subdivision at 3 AM. But these green machines have struggled to convert riders who crave the shriek of a 1-liter sport bike at 14,000 rpm, or the “potato-potato” rumble of a Harley V-twin. Leaving the shrieking and rumbling aside, the Verge-Donut team say their bikes, motors and batteries overcome those challenges.
The TS will integrate batteries with no lithium or liquid electrolyte to conduct ions, replaced by ceramics that trim weight and improve safety, charging performance and charging speeds. Buyers can choose between a 20.2- or a 33.3-kilowatt-hour battery pack, with a claimed energy density of 400 watt-hours per kilogram. That’s a healthy jump over the roughly 200-300 watt-hours per kilogram of typical lithium EV batteries. And with its Donut Lab motor whirring away inside it, the signature hubless rear wheel of the TS Pro, like the “light cycle” from the movie Tron, will turn heads and blow minds.
Twice the Range of Electric Highway Bikes
The Verge TS’s Large Battery version will roam for up to 600 kilometers (370 miles), more than double the range of a typical electric two-wheeler. With a 200-kilowatt peak rate, the Verge should charge from 20 percent to near-full in less than 10 minutes. Riders will pay a premium for all this tech: A TS Pro starts at $29,900 in the U.S., with the Large Battery adding another $5,000.
Several of the world’s leading battery experts, including General Motors’ Kurt Kelty — Tesla’s former battery chief, no less — have publicly stated that solid-state tech remains years from showrooms. The same goes for other advanced battery technologies, such as lithium-metal, which is being developed by the Volkswagen-backed startup Quantumscape.
Ville Piippo, Donut Lab’s co-founder and CTO, acknowledged the skepticism that shrouds the technology like so many pesky ions. That skepticism stems largely from Donut’s lack of publicized experience in designing or manufacturing batteries. In addition, the company has so far shared no technical details of what’s inside these cells. Donut acknowledges all that, and says the proof is forthcoming, including on the motorcycles it intends to begin delivering to customers in coming months.
“If the world is pouring billions and billions of dollars into solid state, why haven’t they figured this out?” Piippo asks rhetorically. “The answer is the same as it is for our motors, that we are doing things a different way, and the rest of the world has focused on the wrong thing.”
The Verge Motorcycles TS Pro is immediately recognizable by its hubless rear wheel.Donut Lab
Donut’s latest hubless motor weighs 21 kilograms, barely half that of the previous generation, and is about half the size. It generates 102 kilowatts (137 horsepower) and a staggering 1,000 Newton-meters of peak torque. That allows a 3.5-second launch to 60 mph (102 kph) — quick for an electric motorcycle, but dawdling compared with combustion-engine sport bikes or even supercars. Dragstrip battles aside, Piippo says the electric motor’s broad, relentless powerband is its secret weapon on the street.
“Whenever you twist the throttle, you get immediate, huge acceleration,” he says. “The torque is basically a flat line from zero kilometers per hour all the way to 200” kph, which is the bike’s electronically limited top speed.
Marko Lehtimäki, Verge’s co-founder and CTO, acknowledges that “All the claims (by other companies) have made it hard for us to be believable, but the reality is that solid state has arrived. “It cannot be purely bullshit, or otherwise we’ll be destroying our reputation with consumers,” he argues.
“It cannot be purely bullshit, or otherwise we’ll be destroying our reputation with consumers.” – Marko Lehtimäki, CTO, Verge Motorcycles
Lehtimäki says the companies will be happy to offer media rides, deeper tech dives or factory tours in due course. Beyond motorcycles, they are developing several joint projects, including a defense-grade tactical buggy and drone platform in conjunction with ESOX Group.
“These technologies are also enabling new types of vehicles that have not been possible before,” Lehtimäki says. “That is a kind of Holy Grail that people have been wanting to get to.”
Up Next: A True, Affordable, Electric Roadster
That includes a global effort to design truly lightweight electric sports cars, a conundrum that has stymied everyone from Porsche to Tesla. There are only a couple of two-seat electric sports cars on the market now. One is the US $2.5 million Rimac Nevera, which has failed to capture the hearts or wallets of wealthy supercar buyers. The China-built MG Cyberster is another, but at nearly 2,000 kilograms (4,400 pounds), that roadster is an Ozempic candidate. As with motorcycles, the problem boils down to basic physics: Either the batteries weigh too much, compromising performance, or they’re too small to deliver reasonable range.
Yet CES proved a cornucopia of tech reveals from these feisty players from the Baltics. Donut Lab’s in-wheel motors — though not its solid-state battery — are set to power a limited-production sports car from Longbow. The U.K. start-up introduced its Speedster, a spiritual successor to British bantamweights from the likes of Lotus, Jaguar, and Caterham. The open-air two-seater, built on an aluminum chassis, weighs a svelte 895 kilograms, or a bit under 2,000 pounds, allowing a 0-100 kph sprint (0-62 mph) in 3.5 seconds, and a 275-mile driving range. Even if that weight claim proves overly optimistic, consider that a Mazda Miata – among the lightest modern mass-market sports cars—checks in at roughly 1,100 kilograms (just over 2,400 pounds) in soft-top guise. Longbow insists it’s ready to kick off Speedster production later this year, though only 150 copies at first, priced at £84,995. A second Roadster model claims a roughly 1,000-kg (2,200-pound) curb weight.
Beyond bikes and sports cars, a new collaboration with the WATT Electric Vehicle Company will integrate a pair of Donut in-wheel motors on the rear axle of WATT’s lightweight aluminum EV platform, Piippo says. Called PACES, for Passenger and Commercial EV Skateboard, the modular unit aims to give EV start-ups a turnkey platform around which they could design a vehicle with relative ease.
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