My encounter with Lucid started when I wandered into the Lucid Studio in Beverely Hills in early 2021. There, I sat and watch a (ultra-Geeky) video of Rawlinson explaining the construction of the Lucid drive motors. How skin-effect affected the efficiency and on-and-on-and-on! It transformed me back to my freshman and sophomore years of my college days! I walked out of the Lucid Studio thinking, boy, they must make a great car with that kind of knowledge! Indeed, Lucid did!.
But making a great prototype car is a very different challenge than putting a product into high volume manufacturing.
I am a realist as well. I spent almost all of my career developing, putting into very high-volume manufacturing cutting-edge high-tech products. Some days, I sat in front of customers and got beaten senseless about how sloppy and ignorant I was about HW-SW interactions issues, and I humbly learned from my customers on how to do things right.
My opinions are not born out of I am smart. It was the school of hard knocks. Humbly listening to and learning from my customers and implementing in my organization what I learned from these painful (but rewarding) episodes.
My critical comments on Lucid is not that I want to see Lucid fail, quite the opposite. But I don't think they are on the trajectory to succeed. Repeatedly blaming suppliers, lapses in SW releases, lagging infrastructures to tackle a high-volume, low-tolerance mid-size market both in manufacturing and in service. These are the blind-spots Lucid must address. I hope Lucid manage internalize the risks ahead. it is make-or-break time for Lucid. Self-congratulating accolades will not get you there!
Thus far, the Lucid Air and Gravity market are patronized predominantly by well-to-do customers. These folks often own multiple vehicles and is "philosophical" about progress and setbacks. You will find the mid-market to be much less forgiving! The competition will make sure of that!
