I have been watching this one closely, because I really like the concept ... closely enough to do a little bit of digging and perhaps a little reverse-engineering and plausibility-checking.
It appears that they bought the intellectual property of (now-defunct) Mission Motors, which kick-started their powertrain development.
The company's address is a place in Vancouver. Google Streetview says it's a microbrewery. Perhaps they have a corner office upstairs. It's pretty likely that they're not publicising the whereabouts of where they plan to be assembling this.
They make some extraordinary claims. I'm still interested if they come anywhere close to those claims.
It appears that they are using 21700-series cylindrical lithium-ion cells with a battery capacity of a little under 20 kWh. Those are the same cells that the Tesla Model 3 uses, by the way. The specifications of those cells are readily available. Nominal voltage 3.7 volts, nominal capacity 5000mAh (seems that the actual capacity when tested is more like 4800 mAh), output current rating varies depending on who makes the cell but seems to be 10 or maybe 15 amps continuous. Crunching the numbers finds that if the nominal bus voltage were 450 volts DC (found that number when digging for tech details on their website), which is not unusual for EVs nowadays, that requires 120 cells in series, and 9 such battery modules together would have a nominal capacity of 19.2 kWh based on 4800mAh per cell. So, that's probably what they are doing. (FWIW a Tesla Model 3 has 4 times as many of the exact same battery cells.) The weight of these batteries (in the Damon) would be 74 kg ... that is not bad. Their claim of the whole bike weighing 440 lbs (200 kg) looks plausible. The size of the battery assembly shown on their website also looks plausible. So far, so good.
Power? They say 200 horsepower (= just under 150 kW). At 450 volts DC, and allowing for some losses, the current required would be 333 amps. This is coming from 9 battery modules in parallel ... 37 amps each, from cells with a continuous power rating of 10 - 15 amps depending on which ones you buy. But Tesla is extracting 360-ish kW from 4 times as many cells, so they are "overclocking" their cells, too, although not by as much. So, that 200 hp will be "intermittent" (seconds at a time) ... fair enough. It appears that Damon is using a cooling system (there is a visible radiator) so perhaps that gives some leeway. Let's suppose we abide by manufacturer's ratings, 15 amps x 9 modules in parallel x 450 volts = 60 kW = 80-ish horsepower, and that's the "continuous" rating. Still decent. If they overclock it for intermittent operation by the same factor Tesla does (about 1.5) ... 120 horsepower ... Good enough. (FWIW Tesla's "ludicrous" and "Plaid" modes are also taking considerable liberty with intermittent cell ratings, so this is going to be like that, too.)
Top speed and range are somewhat linked because these both depend on aero drag. Let's tackle range first. They claim 201 miles (324 km) at 60 mph (97 km/h) - frustrating why a Canadian company is giving old-English units but be that as it may. We need to estimate how much power it takes to go 60 mph = 97 km/h = 27 metres per second.
We know, roughly, that a normal superbike needs about 180 hp = 135 kW to do 300 km/h = 83 metres per second and that's with the rider in a racing tuck. We know that this is almost entirely aero drag. We know that the force for overcoming aero is a function of speed squared and the power for overcoming aero is a function of speed cubed. So, 135 x (27/83)^3 = 4.6 kW. Similar math for my Yamaha R3 race bike with me on it (tops out, optimistically, around 175 km/h with 42 hp) gives 5.4 kW. Similar math for my cbr125 with me on it (about 110 km/h with 12 hp) gives 6.2 kW. The number is going up for the smaller and lower-powered bikes because this simplistic method isn't accounting for tire friction, which is in reality taking a greater and greater proportion at lower speeds. I'm going to say that 6.5 kW is probably what the Damon is going to need, to go 60 mph (97 km/h). (It's probably around 4.6 kW for aero and 1.9 for tire friction - and that's plausible)
So then, the range is simply (19.2 / 6.5) x 60 = 177 miles = 285 km (puttering along at 97 km/h). That is decent. Bear in mind that real-world riding on secondary roads involves lots of lower speeds if you want to keep your driver's license. Also, EVs tend to do relatively better around town. Even if this doesn't quite meet their claim ... it's still decent.
This post is getting long. Continued in the next one.
