LION E-Mobility AG disclosed that its Chief Executive Officer, Dr. Joachim Damasky, will retire at the end of January 2027 and step down from the Board of Directors, a transition that removes the executive who steered the battery maker through a financial restructuring and the industrial launch of its first proprietary battery platform. The announcement, carried by NEWMEDIAWIRE, matters less as a routine succession notice than as a marker of how far the Zug-based company has moved in three years, and how much of that progress now depends on completing the handover without disruption.
Dr. Damasky will remain in office until his departure to ensure a smooth transition and will stay available to LION as an adviser afterward. Operational responsibility for the German subsidiaries LION Smart GmbH and LION Smart Production GmbH will pass to a new Managing Director, who the company said will be announced shortly. That division of duties is significant: it separates day-to-day manufacturing from the CEO role at a moment when LION is trying to scale output and broaden its customer base.
The central achievement of Dr. Damasky's tenure is the NMC+ battery platform, which LION developed and modernized and which became the company's first own battery to reach series maturity. The company described it as the first series development of LION Smart and a demonstration of its capabilities as a battery OEM. Production resumed at the end of June 2026 following conversion of the plant, and LION is now delivering NMC+ packs to customers. By the time Dr. Damasky leaves, the NMC+ production line is to be fully automated, a milestone that would reduce unit costs and support volume growth.
Financially, the retirement comes after a completed restructuring. Revenue rose 68% in 2025 to EUR 28.3 million, and EBITDA reached EUR 7.5 million. Those figures give the incoming management a stronger base than Dr. Damasky inherited, though the company's next priorities, strengthening the supply chain and broadening the customer base, are the harder tasks in a competitive battery market.
NMC+ packs are aimed at demanding applications in e-mobility, industrial uses and safety-critical segments including defence, a positioning that could insulate LION from some consumer-market volatility. In parallel, LION has expanded its battery energy storage business. The first construction phase of the Finsterwalde BESS project is complete, and the project pipeline continues to grow, with the stated goal of becoming the leading system integrator for battery systems in Germany and Europe. The company also advanced immersion cooling technology to improve thermal management, safety, reliability and performance.
Ian Mukherjee, Chairman of the Board of Directors, credited Dr. Damasky with leading LION through restructuring and bringing NMC+ into production, and said the board is pleased he will complete the automation of the line and remain available as an adviser. Dr. Damasky said NMC+ is in production and the line will be fully automated by the end of January, adding that together with the BESS business the team has a strong foundation for the next steps.
For investors, the implication is a test of institutional depth: the restructuring and product launch are complete, but the automation deadline, the BESS scale-up and the naming of a new Managing Director will determine whether LION can convert its turnaround into durable growth. Further details are available in the original release.
