Daily Shorts: Lyten raises $200 in Series B, Amazon buys credits for direct air capture

Battery startup Lyten, Inc, announced it had raised $200 million in funding aimed at helping it scale up manufacturing and commercialize its first three product lines: Lithium-Sulfur batteries (commercial production to start later this year), lightweighted composites, and next generation IoT sensors. The Series B round was led by Prime Moves Lab, a venture capital firm with over $1.2 billion in assets under management that invests in breakthrough technologies. With the latest round, Lyten has raised more than $410 million in equity since being founded in 2015.

Amazon announced its first investment in direct air capture (DAC), an emerging technology which removes emissions from the atmosphere. The e-commerce giant said it would purchase removal credits for 250,000 tons over 10 years from 1PointFive DAC in Texas, a week after Microsoft signed a multi-year deal with another firm – Heirloom – to purchase 315,000 metric tons. DAC is still in the early stages of commercialization, but projects are receiving government grants and large companies are showing interest.

Stellantis marque Peugeot unveiled a new, all-electric version of the company's top-selling 3008 model in a coupe SUV format, hoping to capitalize on the conventional model's popularity. The new 3008 will be manufactured in Sochaux, France, and be available for purchase from February next year. The vehicle will use EV batteries from a unit of BYD, before switching to an EV battery made by ACC, a joint venture between Stellantis, TotalEnergies and Mercedes. The conventional 3008 has sold in excess of 1.3 million units across 130 countries.

China's installed solar capacity could double to 1,000 GW by the end of 2026, from more than 500 GW by the end of 2023, energy research firm Rystad Energy said in a note. That would help the country meet its target well before the planned date: the government wants installed solar and wind capacity to exceed 1,200 GW by 2030, and by end of last year, had installed capacities of 392 GW for solar and 365 GW for wind, accounting for about a third of the world's total.