Surely that's the joke. There must be two or three of these "scientists make material stronger and lighter than steel" headlines every year for decades (probably for as long as steel has existed, lmao.) The headline never specifies what they actually mean by "stronger than steel", but the naive reader would walk away with the impression that steel is now an obsolete material, which never pans out.
Perhaps these materials scientists are in a friendly competition with the scientists behind all the "Scientists invent revolutionary new battery technology" headlines.
