Lucid announces midsize EV platform, says profitability lies with SUVs

Three smaller SUVs are in development, starting at under $50,000.

See full article...

 

[ERIFNOMI]

Why is a wagon useful but not a minivan? Just permanently take out or stow the third row and you have basically the same thing except with sliding passenger doors

Because it's needlessly long.

And if you're going to argue about cars being taller to their detriment, minivans are taller than wagons. A Chrysler Pacifica of a foot taller than an A6 Estate. The whole reason us wagon folks cling to the dream of wagons being resurrected is that they're like a sedan in ride and seating position, but with a bigger cargo area.

 

[RZetopan]

With the two door "cybercab", did they consider people with mobility issues? If you are in a wheelchair, would you be able to take a cab ride without getting help from anyone?

Musk didn't consider them for one second...

Surely, no one could have ever seen that coming from an actual Nazi psychopath. Killed off USAID to starving children, has at least 14 children from baby mommas that he has paid to bear his progeny, etc. “The fundamental weakness of Western Civilization is EMPATHY” -- Elon Musk

 

[RZetopan]

Do you have a source for that? Just asking the tough questions here.

Of course, it will have doors, federal regulations require them. On the other hand, there may be a “modest” monthly fee for using the doors. With increased charges for exiting after a crash when the vehicle is on fire, etc. Neom isn't going to just build itself. Flying cars are so expensive.
https://www.euronews.com/culture/20...us-plans-for-the-line-and-futuristic-megacity

 

[RZetopan]

I'm hoping this little thing over in the middle east keeps going for a decade or more. The US needs much higher gasoline prices for a few years to sort out the truck/suv loop hole and achieve a higher average CAFE rate on new vehicles. Plastic becoming much more expensive would be nice as well. Might even put a dent into datacenter operations.

Since the Orange Menace has rolled back the CAFE standards, exactly where does your “hope” derive from for achieving higher average MPG? The head idiot is not influenced by what fuel costs are for the serfs common people. He claims his moronic policy will reduce consumer costs, of course, it will actually have the opposite effect.
https://cepr.net/publications/trumps-cafe-rollback-is-a-short-sighted-bet/

 

[Anonymous Chicken]

Not really, it's a half-assed product and a terrible value.

Half-assed? Point out a superior EV van.

You can argue its price is too high, especially in the US. Yet apparently 2023 models have been trending up in price on the used market around here in Norway, even as other EVs do the usual thing and go down. You can complain about the range, but even the SWB AWD version has better range than all other EV vans except the other flavors of Buzz. You can complain about the capacitive controls, but that was just standard VW in those years. Same for software, which incidentally seems mostly harmless these days.

 

[.wojtek]

SUV is the dumbest form factor ever... bulky, hard go go around city (check if not usania) with less space inside compared go regular "city car" or even combi / wagon

 

[Fredjax]

What I would like is the EV equivalent of an old Subaru Baja. No internet connection, no phone home. Car Play or a standard unit with a DIN2 chassis. A car like they used to be 15-20 years ago, but with an electric motor. With something like that, it would be: "Please take my money".

But who am I kidding? That will never happen in this timeline.

Dacia spring ?

 

[Mintaka87]

Well every comment (over 1000) on a recent NYT news story about the current auto market was demanding just such a car (well not quite a Baha but a simple car with dials and buttons and no screen menus required to operate basic functions.)

I agree with that sentiment but that isn't exactly what the OP was talking about. They said

What I would like is the EV equivalent of an old Subaru Baja. No internet connection, no phone home. Car Play or a standard unit with a DIN2 chassis. A car like they used to be 15-20 years ago, but with an electric motor. With something like that, it would be: "Please take my money".

While there are some points I agree with about modern cars sending too much data to the company, there are others that fall flat. They were saying that someone should make a new Subaru Baja (which wasn't exactly a best seller in its heyday) and give it a 20 year old infotainment system. No, that isn't going to sell.

 

[TheColinous]

Then I expect you to put your money where your mouth is and buy a Slate.

Or the Dacia Spring, from the brand that needs your car to survive the mountainous snowy backroads of the inner Balkans. It's four wheels, a steering wheel, an electric motor and little else. There's not much can go wrong in it.

In my neck of the woods, the image below is what I am often confronted with. I appreciate my higher ground clearance in my crossover. The middle section, between the tracks, is often quite overgrown and lumpy.

 

[WildGunman]

I find buying an EV from the Saudis as distasteful as buying one from Elon, and I'm certain that's a common sentiment.

I doubt it. Everyone knows that Tesla is run by Elon Musk. The fact that the Saudi Sovereign Wealth fund has a majority stake in Lucid barely registers. Most people have no idea. Mid-market suv buyers much more so.

 

[KnightRT]

The Lucid Earth is aimed at “trendsetting achievers” and will be the more spacious one. The Lucid Cosmos we expect to be sportier—this one is targeting “upscale nurturers.”

I've had a lingering distaste for this brand and I'm starting to understand why. These sort of vapid brand personas, egg styling that eschews hard edges, and the choice of a genderless Timothee Chalamet to be their representative all feel overtly feminine. And that's just not how I want to feel when I'm driving it. If the uptake of SUVs relative to minivans is any indicia, I'm not even sure women want to feel that way. I have enormous respect for their engineering, but I really think the marketing team needs a reboot.

 

[spVolt]

I doubt it. Everyone knows that Tesla is run by Elon Musk. The fact that the Saudi Sovereign Wealth fund has a majority stake in Lucid barely registers. Most people have no idea. Mid-market suv buyers much more so.

There is also Lucid having pulled about $8 billion of Saudi money back into the US and provided both high tech and factory jobs for several thousand people, including developing EV technology that won’t disappear even if the company goes under. That doesn’t justify the evil but makes the cost/benefit more complex.

 

[jhodge]

Tesla's stock price for the last 8 years indicates investors thought it was going to capture 95% of the global car market forever and raise gross margins by 5x over incumbent car manufacturers. Still hasn't come down much from that level either.

Individual investors, especially those invested in meme-like stocks, aren't noted for their dispassionate analysis.

 

[some guy in San Diego]

Well every comment (over 1000) on a recent NYT news story about the current auto market was demanding just such a car (well not quite a Baha but a simple car with dials and buttons and no screen menus required to operate basic functions.)

Online comments are not a reliable predictor of actual consumer behavior.
Especially not online comments about cars in the comments section of a newspaper based in the city with the highest percentage of non-drivers in America.

 

[foboz1]

I still hear that their software stack is glitchy AF. Hopefully they've put more effort into it as the startup/early adopter excuse is getting old and absolutely will not fly for higher volume vehicles.

 

[timber]

Tesla isn't maintaining a stronger grip in the US; their sales are in freefall. And presumably Lucid is shooting for volume European sales with a more suitable and smaller vehicle than the Air and Gravity.

But....yeah. I think Lucid is ultimately valuable for its tech and IP, not its future sales. They've put a lot of attention into drivetrain efficiency and overall range - but I think ultimately, they'll get absorbed by one of the bigger existing OEMs and that IP used to improve that company's portfolio.

As bad as things may be in the US my bet is that they will get a lot worse in other large markets.

 

[Snark218]

Why is a wagon useful but not a minivan? Just permanently take out or stow the third row and you have basically the same thing except with sliding passenger doors

Because a minivan is just as tall as a crossover and too fucking big to boot. Most of us do not need to seat 7-8 passengers.

 

[Selethorme]

that don't differentiate significantly from the rest of the market

The range and autonomous capabilities do pretty well there. But also when it's the hottest market, you don't need to be the market leader to still be doing well. Selling a competitive vehicle is all you need. See Mazda.

frankly, I think it's insane they didn't start with SUVs/crossovers to start with.

...Tesla did the exact same thing, and as much as Musk sucks, it is a successful brand. A comically overvalued one, but a successful brand.

Are you kidding? I'd buy the hell out of that compared to the current spyware tablets on wheels. The only upcoming EV I am even considering is the Slate, and we'll see if it ever comes to fruition.

Whoever first moves away from these large tablet screens and returns to tactile console controls is going to make a killing.

These comments together really just don't align with consumer market research (one of the primary reasons that these companies do this). People on tech forums and car sites aren't the average person.

When an SUV increases the height by 30% they also raise the ground clearance by a large fraction of that which gives a much smaller increase in volume.

This just doesn't math out, even ignoring that the original 30% number was just hypothetical. The average height of a midsize SUV is 1750mm. The average sedan is 1400 mm. The height increase there is 25% more. The average ground clearance of a sedan is around 170mm, and the average midsize SUV is 190mm. That's about a 12% difference. You're still getting 13% more space.

 

[Snark218]

...Tesla did the exact same thing, and as much as Musk sucks, it is a successful brand. A comically overvalued one, but a successful brand.

You aren't wrong, but I also think Tesla's trajectory is pretty sui generis, and largely because Musk sucks - without that guy's cult of personality and memestonking, Tesla has a stock price of about $37 and is doing about as well as Lucid. Being a first mover is also an important part of the story, admittedly. But I think Musk had buyers ready to buy whatever he wanted to sell them, even a lumpy hatchback with the side profile of a dead guppy - sorry Model Y owners - and he shaped his own market in a way Lucid can't.

And now, in a world where the big OEMs have finally woken up and are putting out cars like the iX3, and even Rivian is putting out competitive and compelling product, Lucid needed to be skating where the puck was going, not where it was. Even most luxury buyers are not that interested in big, stately sedans.

And honestly, as much as I like Lucid's vaguely mid-century look and feel, Rivian is a lot more on the pulse of what consumers want now - sporty, rugged, squared-off like a Telluride, vaguely Patagonia-ish.

 

[jezra]

Then I expect you to put your money where your mouth is and buy a Slate.

That is not a good comparison and it would be a waste of money. No one who wants a 4 door car should consider a Slate, and no one who wants a 2 door coupe utility like the Slate, should consider a 4 door vehicle. In terms of Subarus, the Slate is far more akin to the BRAT.

One of my favorite utes (that I have owned) was 1994 Toyota Pickup: 2 doors, good enough bed size, and lumber racks are available. That is why I am interested in the mythical Slate, and I have zero interest in any pickup that sacrifices bed length for increased passenger capacity.

 

[Dr Gitlin]

I've never seen an article where someone ran the numbers on vehicle costs, but does a 2+2 or 4 seater really make a significant enough difference in ROI that it would make it worth only manufacturing 2 seaters? I just assumed the reason Tesla was doing it was because they're claiming they'll be renting out everyone else's 4 seaters (model 3s and Ys)

I discussed this with BMW's design chief a few years ago: https://meincmagazine.com/cars/2022/0...-we-talk-bmw-design-with-adrian-van-hooydonk/

 

[stormcrash]

Because a minivan is just as tall as a crossover and too fucking big to boot. Most of us do not need to seat 7-8 passengers.

A minivan is not a tall crossover, and a wagon seats the same number if the third row is installed, though I've also never seen a normal non commercial minivan go above seven. The whole point of a minivan was to drive like a car and be built like one, but with a low level floor. In what world is the height of a minivan ever an issue? Minivans are just better at their job than wagons, they're pretty much the most space efficient vehicle we've ever built for consumers in terms of passenger and cargo hauling

 

[Dr Gitlin]

I'm hoping this little thing over in the middle east keeps going for a decade or more. The US needs much higher gasoline prices for a few years to sort out the truck/suv loop hole and achieve a higher average CAFE rate on new vehicles. Plastic becoming much more expensive would be nice as well. Might even put a dent into datacenter operations.

Let's just have a big old economic contraction in that case, that's what you're asking for. Do you pick which of us lose our jobs in your scenario?

 

[Snark218]

A minivan is not a tall crossover, and a wagon seats the same number if the third row is installed, though I've also never seen a normal non commercial minivan go above seven. The whole point of a minivan was to drive like a car and be built like one, but with a low level floor. In what world is the height of a minivan ever an issue?

I mean, that was in response to someone telling me crossovers were illogical because they add too much frontal area. If you're prioritizing minimizing frontal area in a two-box vehicle, that looks like a wagon.

Minivans are just better at their job than wagons, they're pretty much the most space efficient vehicle we've ever built for consumers in terms of passenger and cargo hauling

But at the end of the day, I just don't need that much space, efficient or not. I have one kid and (deep sad sigh) now just the one dog. We go camping a couple times a year and our entire loadout fits, by design, into the trunk of a Rav4 and a Thule roof box.

Build me a PHEV Mitubishi Delica and baby, take my money. Anything bigger than that is just wasted on us.

 

[Anonymous Chicken]

A minivan is not a tall crossover

A minivan is... a crossover with sliding doors?

I'm mostly familiar with stuff from the VW empire right now, and I suspect the difference in ground clearance between SUV/crossover id.4 or van/minivan id.buzz or wagon id.7 is the height of the sidewall on the tires. The powertrain bits appear to be largely interchangeable (although I would not be surprised to hear there are subtleties).

 

[Snark218]

I discussed this with BMW's design chief a few years ago: https://meincmagazine.com/cars/2022/0...-we-talk-bmw-design-with-adrian-van-hooydonk/

I cannot read his name without recalling that someone - Jack Baruth is the kind of guy who'd say it, but I think it was someone else - once noted that Hooydonk was the actual designer of most of Chris Bangle's weird rear end designs, and that rightfully, that's not a Bangle Butt but a Hooydonk Badonkadonk.

 

[Dr Gitlin]

Shame that writer is one of the most repellent characters in this industry. Just a bad piece of work.

 

[stormcrash]

I mean, that was in response to someone telling me crossovers were illogical because they add too much frontal area. If you're prioritizing minimizing frontal area in a two-box vehicle, that looks like a wagon.

But at the end of the day, I just don't need that much space, efficient or not. I have one kid and (deep sad sigh) now just the one dog. We go camping a couple times a year and our entire loadout fits, by design, into the trunk of a Rav4 and a Thule roof box.

Build me a PHEV Mitubishi Delica and baby, take my money. Anything bigger than that is just wasted on us.

Yeah if you don't need the space then sure. The OP though at least to me though implied need to carry a decent number of people or cargo, and given those circumstances I see why the minivan mostly killed the wagon, it's just better at doing those jobs.

Frontal area can be a big misnomer on efficiency. The original 80s ford Ranger for instance, with a flat truck face, was actually more aerodynamically efficient than the Mustang at the time. And minivans have better forward visibility at the hood compared to most SUVs and crossovers due to the lower ride height. Having the visibility and maneuverability of a car was basically the original design remit for the Dodge Caravan as the pioneering minivan

 

[stormcrash]

A minivan is... a crossover with sliding doors?

I'm mostly familiar with stuff from the VW empire right now, and I suspect the difference in ground clearance between SUV/crossover id.4 or van/minivan id.buzz or wagon id.7 is the height of the sidewall on the tires. The powertrain bits appear to be largely interchangeable (although I would not be surprised to hear there are subtleties).

My reference for a minivan would be things like the Honda Odessey, Toyota Sienna, Kia Carnival (Sedona), and the Chrysler Pacifica. Compared to SUVs or crossovers minivans have lower floor loading for getting in and out, and handling much more like a car. They're mor in line with the origin of the station wagon an embiggened car than as a lifted off roader with sporty handling that spawned the modern SUV.

Interestingly the current Kia Carnival does it's best to look like an SUV at a distance but you can just tell that it's not even if you can't put your finger on what is different something of the substance of the design just is

 

[andygates]

"Profitability lies with SUVs..." meanwhile in London, wank tanks are getting more restrictions 'cos they're more dangerous. Folks, you don't have to buy monster trucks.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...ould-face-extra-charges-for-driving-in-london

 

[Snark218]

Shame that writer is one of the most repellent characters in this industry. Just a bad piece of work.

Guy has produced a few good turns of phrase, but goddamn does he suck ass.

 

[Snark218]

Half-assed? Point out a superior EV van.

You can argue its price is too high, especially in the US. Yet apparently 2023 models have been trending up in price on the used market around here in Norway, even as other EVs do the usual thing and go down. You can complain about the range, but even the SWB AWD version has better range than all other EV vans except the other flavors of Buzz. You can complain about the capacitive controls, but that was just standard VW in those years. Same for software, which incidentally seems mostly harmless these days.

For the same price, I can buy an EV9 or Ioniq9; the van form factor has a bit more room, but both have better range, better interiors, and more power.

 

[Snark218]

"Profitability lies with SUVs..." meanwhile in London, wank tanks are getting more restrictions 'cos they're more dangerous. Folks, you don't have to buy monster trucks.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...ould-face-extra-charges-for-driving-in-london

We're discussing vehicles the size of a Model Y or Rav4, not Range Rovers or Land Cruisers.

 

[stormcrash]

We're discussing vehicles the size of a Model Y or Rav4, not Range Rovers or Land Cruisers.

Or those G wagon abominations

 

[anazoal]

I find buying an EV from the Saudis as distasteful as buying one from Elon, and I'm certain that's a common sentiment.

No it's not.
I didn't know y'all was still counting - David Chappelle

 

[el_oscuro]

Then I expect you to put your money where your mouth is and buy a Slate.

I just might. I was looking at a Maverick hybrid for my next car, but if this one is available, I will definitely give them the first look. According to their website, it is exactly what I want.

 

[stormcrash]

I just might. I was looking at a Maverick hybrid for my next car, but if this one is available, I will definitely give them the first look. According to their website, it is exactly what I want.

I have a maverick hybrid and I'm quite happy with it, got it at the tail end of last year. The slate looks interesting for sure but it's also going to be very barebones feature wise compared to even the Maverick, but man does it have that classic truck look. If you can hold out Fords next EV small truck is due out next year supposedly targeting the same price bracket.

 

[Anonymous Chicken]

For the same price, I can buy an EV9 or Ioniq9; the van form factor has a bit more room, but both have better range, better interiors, and more power.

Around here, buzz undercuts the price of EV9 easily, and Ioniq 9 probably by a ways too (but I'm not going to look through trim levels and really settle that). As for better interior, thats your opinion. As for power, its abundant regardless. That leaves you with range I guess.

 

[85mm]

The range and autonomous capabilities do pretty well there. But also when it's the hottest market, you don't need to be the market leader to still be doing well. Selling a competitive vehicle is all you need. See Mazda.

...Tesla did the exact same thing, and as much as Musk sucks, it is a successful brand. A comically overvalued one, but a successful brand.


These comments together really just don't align with consumer market research (one of the primary reasons that these companies do this). People on tech forums and car sites aren't the average person.

This just doesn't math out, even ignoring that the original 30% number was just hypothetical. The average height of a midsize SUV is 1750mm. The average sedan is 1400 mm. The height increase there is 25% more. The average ground clearance of a sedan is around 170mm, and the average midsize SUV is 190mm. That's about a 12% difference. You're still getting 13% more space.

You missed out the other leg of the stool. Run the numbers for a mini van where you have the extra height, but not the extra ground clearance. I was responding to rejection of minivans. I get that SUVs have more space than sedans.

 

[85mm]

That's fine with me, I also like and need a little extra ground clearance.

That's nice. I can't buy them, so they're perfectly irrelevant to me.

Not really, it's a half-assed product and a terrible value.

Yeah, ya fuckin jamoke, I drive a goddamn compact crossover because I want to feel powerful and as a status symbol. Jesus Christ, you guys are tedious.

The exaggerated high nose of crossovers is generally dangerous for pedestrians, is worse for fuel economy and doesn't exist in similar spec cars without SUV styling. It exists just to look powerful because that's what the market responds to. Fine, that's not what you care about, but enough do that it's become the expected styling.