Another new American force is coming to China!
Lucid, a high-end pure electric vehicle company established in the United States, is gearing up for China, the largest auto market.
Just two days ago, Lucid quietly updated dozens of job postings on its official website, showing that the job site is located in Shanghai, and the job postings involve digital informatization, hardware engineering, law, logistics management, supply chain, retail , etc. There are a total of 14 positions in each field.
Lucid did not specify the number of recruits for each position, but many positions require proficiency in both Chinese and English, or two or more years of work experience in Chinese companies.
From the perspective of recruitment positions, Lucid pays more attention to localized services in China , such as software algorithms and supply chain management.
Source: Lucid
For a long time, Lucid has been hailed as the ” Tesla killer “, no matter the model or positioning, it almost always chases after Tesla. Now Lucid, who has been belatedly aware of it, has finally begun to make efforts in the Chinese market.
But just two days ago, Tesla CEO Musk joked on Twitter, “ Lucid is not far from going bankrupt .”
Who is Lucid?
In November last year, Lucid stated in its first financial report after listing that it planned to enter the Chinese market in 2023.
At that time, the company’s CEO Peter Rawlinson said in an interview that he had determined the next ten-year plan for the company’s development, and planned to set up factories in China and the Middle East around 2025.
Source: Lucid
In fact, in May this year, Lucid had already started recruiting in China. At that time, the positions recruited were only for procurement, supply chain and human resources, such as supplier quality manager, supplier quality engineer and so on.
This large-scale recruitment may be the beginning of Lucid’s layout in the Chinese market .
In fact, it seems to many people that it will be a matter of time before Lucid enters the Chinese market.
Because the two founders of this company are both Chinese Americans .
In 2007, former Tesla vice president and director Bernard Tse (Xie Jiapeng) quit Tesla, and another executive who left Oracle, Sam Weng (Wen Shiming), founded Atieva in California, which is Lucid’s predecessor.
Source: Changing Situation
In the early years, the company was not positioned as a vehicle company, but developed advanced technologies for electric vehicles (battery technology and powertrain), and provided products to OEMs as a supplier, such as providing battery technology to Formula E championship cars.
In January 2014, BAIC Group participated in Lucid’s C round of financing with US$100 million, holding 25% of the shares and becoming the largest shareholder of Lucid. In July of that year, Jia Yueting co-invested $200 million in Lucid and became the second largest shareholder. It was also from then on that Lucid made up its mind to transform from a core component supplier to a new energy vehicle manufacturer .
Source: Lucid
In 2016, Atieva changed its name to Lucid Motors , began to enter the new energy vehicle industry, and officially announced its plan to develop all-electric high-performance luxury vehicles. In December of the same year, Lucid’s first model, Lucid Air, was officially released. At that time, the limited edition sold for more than 250,000 US dollars (about 1.74 million yuan), and was produced in its own factory in Arizona.
In 2016, BAIC Group transferred its shares to Jia Yueting due to strategic adjustments. The latter held nearly 40% of the shares and became the largest shareholder. Until 2018, Faraday Future fell into a financial crisis, and Jia Yueting sold Lucid shares.
It was this game of capital that caused the founder Xie Jiapeng to be out of the game.
In July 2021, Lucid was successfully listed in the United States as a SPAC. At its peak, it reached a market value of over 90 billion, and now it is heavily bought by PIF, the world’s most wealthy country, the Saudi sovereign wealth fund.
Source: Web Screenshot
However, since the beginning of this year, as the new energy vehicle market has cooled, Lucid’s stock price has also begun to decline. Now it has fallen to about $8 per share, and its market value has evaporated by half, leaving only $13.4 billion.
and Tesla look down on each other
Musk has repeatedly hinted on social platforms that Lucid is an “old, weak, sick and disabled” who broke away from Tesla.
Why does Musk look down on Lucid so much?
This is because Tesla’s blood flows in Lucid’s bones.
First of all, the founder of Lucid, Bernard Tse (Xie Jiapeng), is the original original shareholder and board member of Tesla .
As early as 2003, when Tesla was just established, Musk was still studying how to launch a rocket. Martin Eberhard, the founder and first CEO of Tesla at that time, invited Xie Jiapeng to join Tesla and let him serve as Tesla’s executive. Vice President and General Manager of Battery Energy, overseeing battery pack design, development and manufacturing for the Tesla Roadster and other automakers.
Later, Xie Jiapeng resigned and founded Lucid, and Martin Eberhard turned around and left Tesla because of some awkwardness with Boss Ma, and became Lucid’s technical consultant.
It is precisely because of this background that it is not difficult for Lucid to poach people from Tesla.
So from the founder to the CEO to the engineer, almost one-third of Lucid’s employees come from Tesla, and 6 of the 12 core executives have a Tesla background , in charge of R&D, manufacturing, supply chain, sales and Finance and other important departments.
One of the most famous executives is Lucid’s current CEO & CTO Peter Rawlinson (Peter Rawlinson). Rawlinson once served as the chief engineer of Models S , joined Atieva as CTO in 2013, and began to serve as Lucid’s CEO in April 2019.
In 2013, Peter Rawlinson, a core employee of Tesla who was publicly ridiculed by Musk, the former Model S chief engineer, joined Atieva. At that time, the “Tesla Killer” took shape.
At this time, Atieva was also making a name for itself in the U.S. for its superior battery technology and powertrain.
Lucid then gathered a large number of former Tesla core employees, including former vice president of production Peter Hochholdinge, former vice president of hardware engineering Eric Bach, vice president of supply chain management Peter Hasenkamp, sales director Doreen Allen, and more.
Source: Web Screenshot
Manufacturing is Tesla’s advantage, and Lucid has stabbed Tesla heavily in these key positions.
The core figures of Tesla back then, the auto veterans in R&D, production, and supply chain, their greatest capital was the successful creation of the epoch-making Model S. Perhaps this is the confidence of Lucid to build luxury cars.
Source: Lucid
This is also why Boss Ma dislikes Lucid, a new car company, more than once. going bankrupt.
The same is true for Lucid of Tesla. Lucid said that Tesla is not their competitor. They will occupy the luxury electric car market. In other words, they think Tesla is more than innovative, but not luxurious enough .
Is there still a chance to enter China?
Judging from those who have jumped over from Tesla, Lucid has the least lack of technology.
After all, they were born in the research of three electric vehicles. The first model, Lucid Air, had the lowest drag coefficient among mass-produced electric models at that time, only 0.21cd.
Source: Lucid
The compact motor in the Lucid Air is one of the lightest and most powerful available , rated at 670 horsepower but weighing just 67 pounds.
Although the technology is innovative enough, for Lucid, entering the Chinese market is not a simple game with Tesla.
Now China is already the world’s largest passenger car market. In the first 11 months of this year, the retail sales of new energy passenger vehicles in my country reached 5.03 million, a year-on-year increase of 100.1%. In November, the retail penetration rate of new energy passenger vehicles rose to 36.3%, an increase of 15% over the same period last year.
Correspondingly, there are new forces such as Wei Xiaoli, Aian and Jikrypton. And in the past few years, Lucid’s main problem was lack of money and slow mass production.
The first thing that needs to be solved in building a car is the problem of funds. Lucid has been unable to deliver the first model because of financial problems. Entering the Chinese market requires the support of large sums of money.
Moreover, the starting price of Lucid’s entry-level version is close to 90,000 US dollars, which is equivalent to 600,000 yuan, while the price of the top model has reached 154,000 US dollars (about 1.07 million yuan). This price is not the main sales force in China’s domestic car market, and it is obviously difficult to form a scale effect. If sales cannot be opened, the next step will be difficult.
Take Tesla as an example. In 2017, the sales volume was 103,181, while the sales volume of Model 3 was only 1,764. This year, the loss was as high as 2.241 billion US dollars. After that, the affordable Model 3 was localized in China, which became the key to Tesla’s comeback.
Source: Lucid
Therefore, it will be difficult for Lucid to gain a firm foothold in the Chinese market without launching a pure electric vehicle with a lower price. But the good news is that according to Lucid’s China strategic plan, there is already the idea of launching a model that is comparable to the Model 3.
However, brand recognition is also an important factor. The current domestic new energy market has become saturated, and there are established car companies in the past and new local car companies in the future, presenting a situation of encirclement and attack .
And until now, Lucid has no official Chinese name, will you place an order?
This article is from the WeChat public account “SuperEV-Lab” (ID: SuperEV-Lab) , author: Wang Lei, 36 Krypton is authorized to publish.
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