At Peak Energy, the Focus is on Avoiding the Missteps of a Big Battery Industry Failure
Steve LeVine profiles GM-backed Peak Energy, which builds sodium-ion stationary storage batteries for AI data centres and the grid as an alternative to China-dominated lithium chemistries. Cofounder and CEO Landon Mossburg (a former Tesla executive and ex-president of Northvolt's North America arm) cofounded Peak in 2023. Last week Peak announced a $108M Series B led by GM to build the first stage of a 4 GWh sodium-ion battery assembly plant in Sacramento, which plans to fulfil $1.1B in orders from Q1 next year. Mossburg's lesson from Northvolt (bankrupt last year after burning about $13B, with $55B in orders, most assets bought by Lyten in summer 2025) is to build sequentially: assemble batteries first, then make cells (being developed with GM), then cathodes, rather than in parallel. Caveat: the thesis that sodium will undercut lithium depends on processing scaling up, 'if everything goes well'.
Why it matters
A founder profile that links a US scaleup directly to Europe's biggest venture-backed failure, with hard data points (Series B size and lead, plant capacity, order book) for Peak Energy, and context for Northvolt and Lyten profiles. Useful for Dealroom's climate-tech and battery coverage and for any Northvolt post-mortem content.
