Lucid's Gravity SUV Is One Step Closer To Reality Now
The first pre-production Lucid Gravity just rolled off the assembly line. Will it still be in customers' driveways before 2024 ends?
Lucid Motors is one step closer to delivering its next vehicle to customers. On Tuesday, the California-based electric vehicle startup's first preproduction Gravity SUV rolled off the production line.
Peter Rawlinson, Lucid's CEO and CTO, announced the milestone in a LinkedIn post and shared a video of himself driving the SUV off the production line. Preproduction models are used for testing and to iron things out before production starts for customer vehicles.
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The Lucid Gravity
Lucid launched its debut vehicle, the Air sedan, in 2021. The three-row, seven-seat Gravity is its next act. Boasting 440-plus miles of range and a starting price under $80,000, it's set to go on sale by the end of 2024.
The Gravity, a three-row SUV, is Lucid's follow-up to the Air sedan, which launched as its first model in 2021. Lucid says the seven-seater will reach customers by late 2024, start at under $80,000 and offer a range in excess of 440 miles.
It's tough to overstate how important the Gravity is to Lucid's future and financial stability. The Air is by all accounts a very advanced EV. But the market for large luxury sedans is rather limited. A big SUV should open Lucid up to a wide new customer base and give it the kind of scale it needs to start clawing its way toward profitability.
Gallery: 2025 Lucid Gravity
Lucid still has a mountain to climb here, though. In the coming months, all eyes will be on whether the company can successfully and smoothly scale up production output to meaningful levels. Tesla had a notoriously painful time ramping up manufacturing of its first mass-market vehicle, the Model 3. Making a few early vehicles is one thing. Churning out hundreds or thousands of complex machines every week is a whole different ballgame.
Or as Tesla CEO Elon Musk, clearly scarred from the "production hell" period of 2018, puts it basically every chance he gets: "Prototypes are easy. Production is hard."
Contact the author: tim.levin@insideevs.com
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