I don’see a ramp up in production until construction is close to being finished at Casa Grande. That has to be real cash burn alone. For comparative purposes, Tesla originally picked up the Fremont 5.3 million square foot assembly plant from the GM bankruptcy for $42 million as assets were liquidated to satisfy creditors. Prior, GM had three production lines under one roof. Toyota kicked in $5 million in hopes that Tesla would build a second line building cars for them. Tesla cashed Toyota out once they no longer needed the infusion of cash. Tesla then fully automated their production line as well. A second assembly line was built under what looked like a temporary building. Once that second line was finished, hand built models outpaced the original robotic line production.
Seeing what is done so far at Lucid’s plant, they have ways to go just on infrastructure build out. There is no local housing available for workers as well. This is before considering all of the associated supply constraints mentioned earlier. I find the whole process interesting. Until Lucid turns a profit, this is dead money as an investment. There are going to be growing pains ahead for Lucid. Deep pockets from Churchill Capital only covers part of the equation.
