Ramping up the battle for dominance in the fledgling sector in the Middle East, US-based EVs maker Lucid Motors announced construction of a factory in Saudi Arabia where it will produce electrical vehicles by 2024, Arab News reports.
Noting the paperwork on the deal is being finalized, the deputy governor of the Saudi Standards, Metrology and Quality Organisation, Saud Al-Askar, has confirmed the announcement that comes few months after Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) invested $1 billion into Lucid in April 2019 – giving it a 67% stake in the firm.
On top of that, PIF has offered a six-month internship program involving working at Lucid Motors’ US offices in California, Newark, and Arizona commencing in January that Saudi graduates can apply for.
Despite the heavy funding, Lucid will have a very hard job to match the success of high-profile EVs rival Tesla considering the fact that its flagship Lucid Air $70,000 plus model due to launch early next year has received only 11,000 orders to date and the next year’s production target is just 20,000 cars.
But claiming its vehicles will be 40% more efficient than any other EC, travelling 17% further for the same size battery pack as the Tesla Model S long range, Lucid hopes to win the EV race on efficiency. With its battery enabling 4.6 miles of travel per kilowatt hour of power, Lucid car has a range of more than 500 miles on a single charge, compared to about 400 miles for the Tesla Model S
It also hopes to stand out from due to its design philosophy with its director of CMF design, Sue Magnusson, pointing to the use of sustainably sourced materials as an integral part of Lucid’s design philosophy.
Lucid had also announced two other more expensive Lucid versions- Dream Edition Performance and Dream Edition Range- costing over $169,000 and with limited production to 500 vehicles that quickly sold out earlier this year and the Kingdom believes its production in the country would be a significant win for the economy, employment, and the Vision 2030.
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