Lucid Hires Apple Veteran to Strengthen Its In-Car Audio Team

[Joe]

Lucid Motors has hired former Apple Inc. veteran Robert Windel to join its in-car audio tuning team, bringing in an expert who helped the tech giant fine-tune the audio for all its products, including iPhones, AirPods, and Macs.

Windel started at the electric vehicle manufacturer last month as a senior Audio Tuning engineer, according to a LinkedIn post, bringing 23 years of experience in the professional audio industry.

 

[Alex]

It'll be easy to hear my work - just go buy yourself a beautiful new Lucid and let me know what you think of the sound
system!

Does that mean the new Lucids have a new sound system or tuning featuring Robert Windel’s work? Seems too fast for someone that just started there.

 

[MGRMLN]

Let's hope both.
Though, I feel like the Surreal Sound Pro is already great aside from missing the sub bass other systems have.
As I've discussed in another thread, the sound is very analogous to the "KEF Sound" from home audio.
The biggest change I'd like to hear is in level matching and system optimization that might run in background.
I think that's where Robert could work his craft, much like his AirPods world.

 

[joec]

Does that mean the new Lucids have a new sound system or tuning featuring Robert Windel’s work? Seems too fast for someone that just started there.

No. The Air's system has not changed physically since launch.

Windel was hired to get the most out of the current system. (I assume he'll also have a say in future systems, of course.)

Given how much Apple has learned over the last few decades about getting better and better sound out of smaller speakers and in various acoustical environments, this is a huge win for Lucid. The Air's system can most certainly be tweaked quite a bit with software.

Now, I just hope Windel also can use his old connections at Apple to get CarPlay to play spatial audio in the Air while they are at it. And maybe a native app as well?