Lucid announced plans to raise prices on its vehicles as much as 13% starting June 1. The company also revealed it delivered 360 new vehicles to customers during Q1 while saying it will build as many as 14,000 vehicles in 2022.
The announcements came as part of the Arizona-based EV maker’s first quarter earnings report. The price increase mirrors moves by other automakers, including most recently fellow EV startup Rivian. However, Rivian announced all its vehicles would be seeing an uptick immediately, even if they’d been ordered at the old price. The company very quickly apologized and announced it was going to honor previous pricing for vehicles in the pipeline.
As of June 1, new reservations will be priced in the U.S. at $154,000 for Air Grand Touring, $107,400 for Air Touring and $87,400 for Air Pure. Those vehicles are currently priced at $139,000, $95,000 and $77,400.
The price for the new Lucid Air Grand Touring Performance model, announced just two weeks ago, will remain priced in the U.S. at $179,000. These prices are for base models, before the potential $7,500 U.S. federal tax credit, and excluding tax, title, license, options and destination fees.
Learning from other companies mistakes
Lucid officials are clearly quick studies on how not to anger a potential customer base.
“We also announced today that we are increasing prices of our vehicles that will go into effect at the beginning of June,” said Peter Rawlinson, Lucid’s CEO and CTO.
“The world has changed dramatically from the time we first announced Lucid Air pricing in September 2020, but I want to reassure our existing reservation holders that we will be honoring current pricing for them as well as for any new reservations made before the end of the month.”
Still on track for results
The company delivered 360 vehicles during the quarter that just ended; however, told investors it was on track to produce between 12,000 and 14,000 vehicles in 2022 — as earlier forecast.
“Looking forward, we remain intently focused on ramping production and are excited about our product roadmap in 2022 and beyond with Air Grand Touring Performance deliveries expected in June; Air Touring and Air Pure later this year; and with our Project Gravity SUV remaining on target to begin production in the first half of 2024,” Rawlinson said.
Sherry House, Lucid’s CFO, also noted the company has reservations for 30,000 vehicles, which represent about $2.9 billion in potential sales. Since the company’s revenue for Q1 was $57.7 million and it posted a net loss of $81.3 million, or 5 cents per share.
That’s quite uptick from the $313,000 in revenue from the year ago period with a $2.9 billion loss — all expected as the company was still in development mode. However, it did end Q1 with $5.4 billion in cash.
