Electric vehicle manufacturer Lucid leases 60,000 square feet in Fremont

Lucid Group Inc. has leased 60,624 square feet of R&D space less than 10 miles from its Newark headquarters.

The electric vehicle manufacturer (NASDAQ: LCID) took the entire industrial facility at 44259 Nobel Drive in Fremont in May, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the deal who were not authorized to speak about it.

The facility, which sits roughly seven miles from Lucid’s Newark headquarters, was previously leased to Fremont-based blood glucose test maker Intuity Medical, which signed for the space in 2021. But Intuity placed 44259 Nobel up for sublease this spring, per marketing materials reviewed by the Business Times, advertising it as research and development space.

Real estate investment trust Prologis, which owns 44259 Nobel, ultimately took the facility back and leased it directly to Lucid, according to one of the sources. The Lucid lease runs through 2030, according to the commercial real estate data site CompStak.

The San Francisco industrial giant (NYSE: PLD) did the same thing in making a deal with Tesla in late May for another Fremont facility that had been slated for use as a manufacturing hub by Santa Clara-based semiconductor manufacturer Applied Materials.

Fremont’s 17 million-square-foot research and development market had a total vacancy rate of 7.2% in the first quarter, according to data from real estate services firm Kidder Matthews. But facilities with specialized laboratory improvements remain in high demand, the firm said.

It was not immediately clear Tuesday how Lucid intends to utilize 44259 Nobel. The company declined to comment.

The company is in the process of building out its 5 million-square-foot manufacturing facility in southern Arizona, it reported in regulatory documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission in February. Lucid is working to expand that facility’s annual production capacity from about 34,000 vehicles to 90,000. The company, which did not disclose any additional details about its leased footprint, also broke ground on a Saudi Arabian facility in 2022.