Apple Watch Series 6 40mm: Won't power on

Hello all! Looking at an Apple Watch for a friend... It won't power on at all no matter what.

Watch has been sitting in a box for last ~6mo because owner complained about super short battery life. I opened the face and the battery measures 2.1vdc and no output on the bmc. Oddly, I can find the ground rail on the bmc but it isn't outputting any power at the watch connector either when on the bench supply. I also tried to feed 3.5vdc directly to the watch battery contacts on the mainboard ribbon, but similarly nothing happened. No current draw was registered on my supply in either case.

In the end, I'm searching here trying to figure out if that is normal and/or if I need to put it on a charge puck to kickstart it first. I'm not sure if I should just consider the thing completely dead or if I should spend the $$ on a new battery/bmc.

Thanks! -Peter.