The Technology Roadmap Wars of Nuclear Fusion: Why Dongseng Chose the Most Obscure Path

The Event

Founded in 2025, the emerging fusion startup Dongsheng Fusion raised hundreds of millions in funding. The story behind it isn't just "another nuclear fusion company raises capital"—it's a hidden technology pathway war.

As the domestic fusion industry rapidly expands—36Kr reports at least dozens of nuclear fusion companies racing forward—Dongsheng made a choice that appears "unconventional": betting on the D-He3 (deuterium-helium-3) fusion pathway rather than the industry mainstream D-T (deuterium-tritium) pathway.

This choice looks like a contrarian move. But if we view it from the angle of technology maturity and market structure reorganization, it actually reflects deeper strategic logic.

Why This Divergence in Pathways?

Nuclear fusion may appear as "one ultimate goal," but there are multiple routes to reach it.

D-T Pathway: Fusion of deuterium and tritium is currently the most technologically mature option closest to commercialization. The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) uses D-T. The advantage is the most successful ignition cases; the disadvantage is it produces radioactive nuclear waste, involving complex regulatory and waste disposal costs.

D-He3 Pathway: Fusion of deuterium and helium-3 produces essentially non-radioactive products without generating long-lived nuclear waste. The disadvantage is higher technical difficulty and less engineering deployment experience. But its advantages are equally radical: completely non-nuclear, low-radiation, and easily deployable to cities and new energy load scenarios.

From pure technical progress, D-T is "a verified known path," while D-He3 is "a more elegant but more distant path."

The Essence of Technology Pathway Betting

This isn't a science question—it's a game theory and positioning problem.

When a new industry hasn't established a definitive technical standard, companies face a classic strategic dilemma:

1. Follow the mainstream pathway: Lower risk (technology proven), but intense competition and thin margins. If the D-T pathway ultimately commercializes, the market will be divided among dozens of fusion companies.

2. Bet on a non-mainstream pathway: Higher risk (possible technical failure or market rejection), but if successful, first movers gain structural monopoly. If D-He3 solves engineering bottlenecks, the label "sole domestic layout" itself becomes a ticket.

Dongsheng's strategic logic may be: I'm not betting that D-He3 is easier than D-T; I'm betting that D-He3 will ultimately become the pathway more friendly to regulation and commercial logic.

Why does this bet have rational basis?

Regulatory direction: Recent news mentioned the Atomic Energy Law of the People's Republic of China taking effect in 2026, explicitly "encouraging and supporting controlled thermonuclear fusion." But if future fusion power stations deploy into cities and embed into power grids, "presence or absence of nuclear waste" becomes a political-economic screening condition. The D-T pathway, however safe, still requires dedicated nuclear waste handling infrastructure; the D-He3 pathway is inherently regulation-friendly.

Market segmentation: Not all energy application scenarios are identical. Large baseload power stations might use D-T; but distributed energy, industrial heat applications, and remote area power supply—D-He3's "easy deployment, zero waste" advantage becomes more prominent.

Financing signal: Dongsheng securing "first-tier marketized fund" financing suggests investors don't view D-He3 as a "niche bet," but rather a differentiated positioning with structural commercial logic.

Analogies and Historical Lessons

This phenomenon isn't rare in emerging industries:

• Early electric vehicles: Tesla chose lithium iron phosphate for long-term stability rather than directly chasing energy density; CATL later dominated the market because of policy shifts and cost advantages.
• Display technology: Samsung chose OLED while competitors chose LCD; OLED had higher difficulty and lower yields, but once mature became the high-end standard.
• Chip architecture: ARM chose simplified instructions while x86 chose complex instructions; ARM ultimately won in mobile.

The common thread: The victory of technological pathways depends not only on technical difficulty itself, but more on what dimension the final market values.

Risks and Counterarguments

But this choice could also fail. The greatest risk is: if the D-T pathway suddenly achieves major engineering breakthroughs (such as waste disposal costs plummeting or regulatory relaxation), all D-He3's advantages evaporate. Dongsheng becomes "a company stubbornly holding to a road nobody travels."

Additionally, even if D-He3 technology ultimately succeeds, Dongsheng as a late entrant (founded in 2025) has far less engineering experience and team accumulation than fusion companies that have iterated for years. Wrong pathway choice + insufficient execution experience = compound risk.

Insights for Readers

This case teaches us:

1. Before industry standards solidify, understanding a company's pathway choice matters more than understanding its funding amount. Dongsheng's hundreds-of-millions funding isn't the story's endpoint; the real bet is whether the D-He3 pathway can work through.

2. Technology pathway success or failure often isn't determined by the technology itself, but by future market, policy, and regulatory structure. When evaluating fusion companies, investors should ask "In 5-10 years, will the market need less waste or lower cost?" rather than just "Whose technology is most mature now?"

3. "Sole domestic player" is both advantage and trap. The advantage is monopolizing the entire segment if the pathway wins; the trap is having no market plan B if it fails.