Tesla Competitor Lucid Motors Breaks Ground On $700M Arizona Plant

Lucid Motors has broken ground on Casa Grande to put up its assembly plant after nearly three years of hanging fire.

The Newark, California-based Tesla competitor announced that its facility would be ready to start manufacturing its luxury sedan by mid-2020. The company tweeted on Monday, "Today, alongside #Arizona Governor @dougducey and local officials, we marked the start of construction of our Casa Grande, Arizona factory. Stay tuned for a full recap coming soon."

Lucid Motors only received approval on a multi-year site plan for its Arizona factory from the local Planning and Zoning Commission on Nov. 6. Land grading took place in September.

The 500-acre site of the company will not be the largest in the world (that title goes to Volkswagen in Wolfsburg, Germany) but is undoubtedly more massive than the Gigafactory in Nevada and even eclipses the currently under-construction Tesla factory in China. The facility will reportedly attract an estimated 4,800 direct and indirect jobs by the next decade and is expected to generate $32 billion in revenue for the Pinal County city.

Lucid Motors makes Lucid Air, a luxury electric vehicle (EV) that the company teased the public with back in 2016. But it almost couldn't commission its production due to the absence of financing. A lucky break came from a $1 billion investment from the sovereign wealth of Saudi Arabia that reignited hopes of seeing the Lucid Air on the road one day.

"The Lucid Air is a cutting-edge electric vehicle designed, engineered, and destined for manufacture entirely in America," said Peter Rawlinson, CEO and CTO of Lucid Motors.

"We are proud to be moving forward on our commitment to manufacturing the Lucid Air in Casa Grande. With supportive investors, an outstanding team of designers and engineers, and a product strategy that extends well beyond the Air, we expect today to be just the start of a longstanding presence in this dynamic city," he continued.

Lucid Air will rival Tesla's Model S and Model X in a competition for the best luxury EV. However, Jaguar and Audi are also both in the race and have successfully cut down Tesla's profits back in August, according to Alliance Bernstein analyst Toni Sacconaghi.