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Emad Dlala out

Companies aren't planets orbiting the sun. They can, and do fail, all the time. Especially new ones. The dawn is not guaranteed.

Open communication with high level executives was great, and cheap marketing, for a still relatively new company. But then many of those publications and YouTubers were given buggy review units. Savagegeese had a video series about the making of Gravity but that only lasted 2 videos before the review, where they hammer Lucid over software issues. That review was 7 months ago.

Lucid has already cut back on their ambitions. With the Air, their self driving tech was supposed to be bespoke like Tesla and Rivian but now they're going to use nvidia's alphamayo for midsize.

I've already criticized Lucid enough for their midsize planning (if I was an investor, I'd actually be angry with their ridiculous segmentation and their corresponding ridiculous description of the buyers) but let's just look at their timeline when compared with their most similar competitor. The Rivian R2 was first revealed in 2024, and is now just being sold. The Cosmos is supposed to be revealed in the 2nd half of this year with sales beginning in 2027. The first prototypes were just spotted in public a couple of weeks ago. That seems like an incrediblly short time frame. How confident should anyone be that they can work out all the issues in less than a year of on-road testing?

How many resources had to be pulled from Cosmos/midsize to fix Gravity's poor launch and continuing issues?

The only skin in this game I have is that I want an 800v R2, and the Cosmos is probably the closest thing to it in the near future. But even though this company's slogan is "Compromise Nothing", I see compromises everywhere when they talk about the Cosmos.
 
borski said:
Marc is great. I don’t want anything I’ve posted to indicate or imply otherwise.
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Never meant to imply that, my statement was just my own thoughts reading the article and had nothing to do with anyone else's comments.

Got to chat with him at EVFest on Saturday about the Gravity, software, MotoGP and the state of electric motorcycles.
 
Leftlane said:
Yep - Tesla was creating everything out of whole cloth - they were literally inventing the ecosystem entirely with no precursors. The companies that have followed have it easier and harder at the same time - they can learn from Tesla’s experience, leverage those suppliers, use tested processes and tech, and hopefully shorten the ramp, but they also now have to compete against an entire army of other brands and much higher (and more demanding) customer expectations. Some brands decided to “bespoke” everything and are paying a terrible price for that decision.

I didn’t go to CEO school, but if fixing the service morass and getting out from under the comically bad spending on rental cars for weeks on end even for basic service items is not priority number one right now, all the rest won’t matter. Lucid has to expand the service footprint, keep customers happy, and stop the absolute hemorrhaging of money to Enterprise. Yes, having the cars operate correctly in the first place would clearly help, but that ship has sailed. The warranty costs are astronomical and aren’t sustainable.

The last thing Lucid needs is to try to push the envelope with a bunch of cool tech that is so different from everyone else, yet misses on the basics and leads to the massive backlog for service.

My prediction is that Lucid ends up being acquired by a legacy OEM to provide the engineering hardware for their own EV ambitions - like an Aston Martin or Lamborghini or even VW. The hardware is so good that there is real value there but the actual business is just a sinkhole swallowing cash.
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I’m a construction executive with 30 years experience and have built many high-rises across the US and beyond including Saudi Arabia. Schindler was on many projects... Compared to other disciplines like HVAC / security/ BMS systems (Johnson controls, Siemens etc) the elevator business sticks out as a non competitive business where the three or four companies have each 4 products and know everything about each others products. The product is a box that gets pulled up and down on rails by a rope. The interiors often done by others. The management of install and service is mostly ridiculous compared to other trades. The innovation in this business is non existence in 30 years I have seen two major improvements that's it. I wish Lucid good luck transitioning to the new CEO and I'm looking forward to seeing what experience of the elevator business will help with making the most innovative car company work better…
 
FrankHaase said:
I’m a construction executive with 30 years experience and have built many high-rises across the US and beyond including Saudi Arabia. Schindler was on many projects... Compared to other disciplines like HVAC / security/ BMS systems (Johnson controls, Siemens etc) the elevator business sticks out as a non competitive business where the three or four companies have each 4 products and know everything about each others products. The product is a box that gets pulled up and down on rails by a rope. The interiors often done by others. The management of install and service is mostly ridiculous compared to other trades. The innovation in this business is non existence in 30 years I have seen two major improvements that's it. I wish Lucid good luck transitioning to the new CEO and I'm looking forward to seeing what experience of the elevator business will help with making the most innovative car company work better…
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If the parallel is true, and you can make a completely undifferentiated company financially viable - I guess that's an ok outcome...
 
socktucker said:
Their hardware is problematic and hard to fix.
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With respect (and I mean this), your experience with your Air is not representative of most.

There’s a reason the Air won countless awards in its first year, and it was largely due to its hardware.
 
borski said:
With respect (and I mean this), your experience with your Air is not representative of most.

There’s a reason the Air won countless awards in its first year, and it was largely due to its hardware.
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I'm talking about the Gravity and its plethora of issues from 3rd row seats bouncing, re welding thousands of seats, light bars falling apart, trim falling off, door handle and window issues that have taken over a year to fix.

key fobs.
 
Leftlane said:
I didn’t go to CEO school, but if fixing the service morass and getting out from under the comically bad spending on rental cars for weeks on end even for basic service items is not priority number one right now, all the rest won’t matter. Lucid has to expand the service footprint, keep customers happy, and stop the absolute hemorrhaging of money to Enterprise. Yes, having the cars operate correctly in the first place would clearly help, but that ship has sailed. The warranty costs are astronomical and aren’t sustainable.
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I really don't know where it became the automaker's responsibility to provide cars for free when a car is in the shop for service anyway. I guess I'm just old school, but I always fend for myself when I need a car serviced. We drop the car off ourselves, we pick it up ourselves, we figure out our own way to get around while it's in the shop.

I'm shocked that somewhere along the way, automakers felt obligated to give people cars for free while theirs is in the shop. As you say, that's gotta be costly. And that's just cost that's gonna be passed through to us. It's another way that adds cost that's often unnecessary. People like me that would normally just fend for ourselves would be tempted to take the rental car just because they're offering it for "free". So we all end up paying more in the end.
 
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dbsb3233 said:
I really don't know where it became the automaker's responsibility to provide cars for free when a car is in the shop for service anyway.
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well in my particular case, they are saying it exempts them from Lemon law. It doesn't, but that's their angle.

My car has been sitting for almost a week, supposedly fixed, just waiting for some car hauler to get it.
 
dbsb3233 said:
I really don't know where it became the automaker's responsibility to provide cars for free when a car is in the shop for service anyway. I guess I'm just old school, but I always fend for myself when I need a car serviced. We drop the car off ourselves, we pick it up ourselves, we figure out our own way to get around while it's in the shop.

I'm shocked that somewhere along the way, automakers felt obligated to give people cars for free while theirs is in the shop. As you say, that's gonna be costly.
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I don't know who initially started it, but it makes total sense as a luxury vehicle service differentiator. Why should a customer spend so much more for a BMW/Mercedes/Audi/Lucid/whoever than for a high spec Toyota/Honda/Nissan? Well, you not only get a nicer/faster car, the service experience is higher as well. They get to sell the luxury experience as an incentive to pay extra for the nicer car.

The problem isn't that Lucid is also looking to offer that service experience. The problem is that they are choosing a terrible service scheduling implementation which causes them to spend WAY more on those loaners or rental reimbursements than they need to be.
 
dbsb3233 said:
I really don't know where it became the automaker's responsibility to provide cars for free when a car is in the shop for service anyway. I guess I'm just old school, but I always fend for myself when I need a car serviced. We drop the car off ourselves, we pick it up ourselves, we figure out our own way to get around while it's in the shop.

I'm shocked that somewhere along the way, automakers felt obligated to give people cars for free while theirs is in the shop. As you say, that's gonna be costly.
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Luxury isn’t asking your neighbors for a ride or walking to the bus stop to get home. When you pony up for an elevated experience, the experience better be elevated. Once one high end maker offered loaner cars (brilliant by the way), others had no choice. BMW used to always give me one level up from what I was currently driving so I could see what I was missing and maybe be tempted to trade up. They sure weren’t putting me in a rental car for weeks on end for an annual service that took 4 months to book and that would make me hate BMW.

I’d argue that the important hardware is where Lucid shines - efficiency, packaging, drive units. The rest of the stuff like fobs were just very poor decisions as far as suppliers and tech go.
 
doubletwist said:
I don't know who initially started it, but it makes total sense as a luxury vehicle service differentiator. Why should a customer spend so much more for a BMW/Mercedes/Audi/Lucid/whoever than for a high spec Toyota/Honda/Nissan? Well, you not only get a nicer/faster car, the service experience is higher as well. They get to sell the luxury experience as an incentive to pay extra for the nicer car.

The problem isn't that Lucid is also looking to offer that service experience. The problem is that they are choosing a terrible service scheduling implementation which causes them to spend WAY more on those loaners or rental reimbursements than they need to be.
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I suspect they've changed policy.

In the 8 (!) shipping situations I have dealt with, they've gotten way worse and obviously cheaper.
It used to be my car would be picked up maybe a day after finished, transported solo in a covered trailer which was really awesome, or by a guy who told me he usually hauls exotics and had an amazing hauler!

...last time...it sat outside for a week while they used "RunBuggy" to try and pick it up. First, the guy didn't show up, then showed up a day late when I wasn't home and didn't speak english. They cancelled that one, then a tow truck tried to pick it up but couldn't because it was too low. Then another truck came and it sat in a tow yard in the ghetto for a day then somehow got to CA. It came back just on a car hauler uncovered.

It had to go back to service the next week. That time they sent some guy with like a uhaul style open trailer and a dodge pickup truck. Watched it on my app and he went to Walmart, Autozone, then it spent the night at his house then he hauled it on a uhaul type trailer and a pickup truck to California....

now its sitting in California, it was "done" June 4, but they're using some truck broker and its still just sitting in a parking lot in California almost a week later.
 
socktucker said:
I'm talking about the Gravity and its plethora of issues from 3rd row seats bouncing, re welding thousands of seats, light bars falling apart, trim falling off, door handle and window issues that have taken over a year to fix.

key fobs.
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Please don’t describe experiences you haven’t had. We have absolutely no idea how widespread any issues are, but many people haven’t had any with Gravity.

Also, this is off topic. Please stay on topic.
 
FrankHaase said:
I’m a construction executive with 30 years experience and have built many high-rises across the US and beyond including Saudi Arabia. Schindler was on many projects... Compared to other disciplines like HVAC / security/ BMS systems (Johnson controls, Siemens etc) the elevator business sticks out as a non competitive business where the three or four companies have each 4 products and know everything about each others products. The product is a box that gets pulled up and down on rails by a rope. The interiors often done by others. The management of install and service is mostly ridiculous compared to other trades. The innovation in this business is non existence in 30 years I have seen two major improvements that's it. I wish Lucid good luck transitioning to the new CEO and I'm looking forward to seeing what experience of the elevator business will help with making the most innovative car company work better…
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This.

I don’t think an elevator business CEO is going to turn Lucid around. They need energy and vision as much as they do sound business decisions for execution on expansion, service, margin and profitability.

Maybe that person doesn’t exist, but this departure suggests whatever Napoli is changing, it’s rubbing key people the wrong way.
 
Miami_Lucid_Man said:
No doubt he was instrumental in developing the products we now know and enjoy, but there is also no doubt this company needs adjustment. It is not sustainable as is and I’m actually excited to see what changes are coming. The company needs new people to move it forward.
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Yeah, no idea if this is the right move or not, but at the same time Lucid is a company that needs to make some moves. Peter, Emad, Eric and the rest of the executive team built a beautiful and special, but also flawed car company that can't just keep doing what got them to where they are - the risk the wheels come off is high. New leadership, especially new leadership when a new CEO comes on board, is probably part of what's needed. That said, what happens next is still up in the Air...

Ahem.

I'll show myself out...
 
Leftlane said:
Luxury isn’t asking your neighbors for a ride or walking to the bus stop to get home. When you pony up for an elevated experience, the experience better be elevated. Once one high end maker offered loaner cars (brilliant by the way), others had no choice. BMW used to always give me one level up from what I was currently driving so I could see what I was missing and maybe be tempted to trade up. They sure weren’t putting me in a rental car for weeks on end for an annual service that took 4 months to book and that would make me hate BMW.

I’d argue that the important hardware is where Lucid shines - efficiency, packaging, drive units. The rest of the stuff like fobs were just very poor decisions as far as suppliers and tech go.
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I see what you did there... "Elevated experience"... Elevator CEO.... very well played.
 
petergottlieb said:
Yeah, no idea if this is the right move or not, but at the same time Lucid is a company that needs to make some moves. Peter, Emad, Eric and the rest of the executive team built a beautiful and special, but also flawed car company that can't just keep doing what got them to where they are - the risk the wheels come off is high. New leadership, especially new leadership when a new CEO comes on board, is probably part of what's needed. That said, what happens next is still up in the Air...

Ahem.

I'll show myself out...
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"in the AIR" ..... You too!!!!! hahaha funny !
 
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