Lucid Motors in turmoil after failing to deliver on production targets

Lucid Motors, a California-based electric car company, is running into some difficulties to hit production targets of electric vehicles. 

The company made a huge splash after introducing their Lucid Air passenger car in mid 2021. Many car reviewers praised Lucid Air’s innovative design, power, range, and build quality. It was believed that Tesla has some real competition on their hands.

Lucid Air is indeed impressive with over 800 km of range in a single charge and over 1100 horsepower for the top-of-the-line model Lucid Air Dream Edition. Naturally, it stirred quite a bit of excitement among automotive enthusiasts.

So, what exactly went wrong?

Lucid Motors promised investors to deliver 12,000 vehicles in 2022. After struggling to reach their first quarter production goals, the company reassured investors that the original prediction is still achievable. By the second quarter, Lucid Motors had to recognize that 12,000 deliveries are just not going to happen in 2022.

The new target slashed the original in half to between 6,000 and 7,000 cars by the end of the year. As if that wasn’t bad enough, some critics are quick to say that in order to achieve this new goal, the company would have to produce 5 times as many cars in the second half of the year as they did in the first.

Lucid’s chief executive, Peter Rawlinson, blamed the remarkable supply chain and logistics challenges that the company had encountered in 2022.

Supply chain and logistics problems seem to be the “new world order” for most car manufacturers in 2022. But such start-ups as Lucid Motors and Rivian are hit particularly hard by this as they do not have anywhere near the infrastructure of larger car manufacturers like Audi, Porsche, Mercedes-Benz, and others. Working with slim margins and a quest to ride the hype wave as quickly as possible does not work in Lucid Motors’ favor.

Lucid Motors’ executives are hopeful and believe they can power through this rough patch and become serious players in the world automotive landscape. Many car enthusiasts are rooting for the company as their current car, Lucid Air, may pave the way for more impressive and more affordable Lucid Motors cars in the future.