- Lucid opened a brand new workplace simply exterior of Detroit
- The automaker has had hassle producing giant portions of autos previously
- It is seeking to faucet into the Huge Three’s expertise pool to scale up operations
Lucid makes some fairly cool vehicles. They’re flashy, quick, and a freakin’ marvel of engineering (do not consider me? Simply watch a few of their tech talks). It is just like the early phases of Tesla, simply with extra consideration to construct high quality and extra investments from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund.
Regardless of constructing a powerful machine, Lucid has been struggling to realize market share with its Air electrical sedan. It is seeking to clear up that downside with the discharge of the Gravity SUV and a extra reasonably priced mannequin underneath the $50,000 mark. Nonetheless, the California-based automaker is aware of that it wants extra than simply high-tech engineering to scale up and make its goals come true. That is the place legacy auto excels. And if you cannot beat ’em, poach ’em.
Lucid formally opened its so-called “Michigan workplace” this week. Formally, the situation is in Southfield, Michigan, which is, give or take, 15 miles from Detroit. Unofficially, it is within the Huge Three’s yard.
The automaker says it opened this plant to develop its R&D, engineering, and operations groups…which is tongue-in-cheek for poaching the core auto staff within the Detroit metro space who’ve been key within the success of designing, constructing, and launching vehicles for legacy carmakers.
Lucid does not want Detroit to show it the way to construct the underlying tech for a automobile. It is already accomplished that and accomplished it extraordinarily properly. The automaker has earned its stripes by constructing out electrical drive items able to, fairly frankly, wizardry. It is also earned a popularity for being a premium model with some reasonably eye-catching styling. None of those are the departments through which Lucid wants assist.
Detroit is crawling with automotive experience. In spite of everything, Ford, GM, and Stellantis have spent actually a century perfecting the craft of large-scale manufacturing. Lucid, however, is not even sufficiently old to vote. Naturally, it is nonetheless going by some rising pains largely surrounding how troublesome it’s to scale up car manufacturing. Tapping into native expertise provides Lucid perception into the way to successfully scale from producing autos by the hundreds to the tens (and finally, a whole lot) of hundreds.
So whereas Lucid could also be gaining some engineers and R&D consultants, the actual expertise to be gained listed here are those that have connections in provide chains, logistics, and manufacturing planning. That is the place a number of the largest secrets and techniques in automotive manufacturing conceal, and Lucid is hellbent on turning over each stone to search out the appropriate folks for the job.
Is it doable for Lucid to succeed by itself? Positive. But it surely’s not going to be a stroll within the park. Lucid has already missed some essential manufacturing targets. For instance, it anticipated constructing 49,000 autos in 2023 and 90,000 in 2024. Final 12 months, it constructed simply 8,428 autos and offered them to six,001 clients.
Maybe Tesla CEO Elon Musk was proper when he mentioned “prototypes are simple, manufacturing is difficult.”
Both manner, Lucid is displaying that it is placing its investments to good use. It desires to succeed, but it surely wants the appropriate folks to maintain the corporate’s head above water. And the transfer to Michigan is a transparent sign: Lucid desires to play on the identical degree as the massive canines and is not afraid to drag from Detroit’s expertise pool to take action.
