By Alice Seeley
California-based electric vehicle startup Lucid Group announced on March 1 that it would cut its car production forecast for 2022 by 40 %, causing the company stocks to fall by 14%.
The news comes after Lucid failed to meet its production goal of 577 vehicles in 2021 by 452 vehicles. This announcement was made in the company’s fourth-quarter results meeting after it was reported that Lucid lost $1 billion during the fourth quarter on revenue of $26.4 million and a total of $4.8 billion in 2021.
Supply chain constraints and parts quality issues were the reasons Lucid gave for cutting production from 20,000 vehicles to 12,000 vehicles. Surprisingly, the company is not suffering from the ongoing global shortage of semiconductor chips but rather from the shortage of commodity parts such as glass and carpet.
“We remain confident in our ability to capture the tremendous opportunities ahead given our technology leadership and strong demand for our cars,” CEO of Lucid, Peter Rawlinson, stated.
After the announcement, Lucid experienced a dramatic drop in its stock. Lucid stock fell from 24.99% to 13.7%. The company was already struggling with its stock when it announced a recall of more than 200 of its premium electric sedans due to a possible safety issue on Feb. 22. Shares sank nearly 5% that day.
Despite cutting back on production, the Lucid Group announced its plans to build a new manufacturing factory in Saudi Arabia. Construction will start in the first half of 2022, with a goal to manufacture up to 150,000 vehicles a year at its peak. This factory is in addition to its factory in Arizona, where it plans to boost capacity to 365,000 vehicles a year.
