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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

A new automaker pulled aside the curtain in Silicon Valley, revealing its name as Lucid Motors and showing off its prototype car, a premium electric sedan. The company previously existed under the name of Atieva, where it got its start developing battery packs for electric vehicle applications.

Impressively, in just two years of development the company is so far along with its first vehicle that it already has a body-in-white, an automotive term for a welded sheetmetal body.

Lucid Motors came out of stealth mode, but only issued a few detail photos of its car.

As part of a limited media gathering where photos were prohibited, I visited the company's Menlo Park, California headquarters, where it has secretly been developing its launch model. Along with seeing the body-in-white and a 90 to 95 percent complete version of the car, Lucid Motors showed off the car's components, from the electric drivetrain to interior design concepts.

Greeting me at Lucid Motors were two of the company's luminaries, Chief Technology Officer Peter Rawlinson who includes Tesla and Jaguar on his resume, and Vice President of Design Derek Jenkins. In Jenkins previous position at Mazda, he designed the latest generation of the MX-5 Miata. Other members of Lucid Motors' staff came over from Tesla.

When I asked for the name of Lucid Motors' electric sedan, Rawlinson demurred, saying that would be announced at a later date.

Lucid Motors builds on Atieva's battery research. The company's patented lithium-ion battery chemistry shows significant resistance to degradation over high power charging cycles, an important ingredient for electric cars. It also claims 20 percent greater energy density in its batteries than competitors, due to its cooling and power control technologies.

With its battery technology and a dual motor system developed for the launch car, Rawlinson said it will get well over 300 miles of range, and the company is considering a 400-mile version as well, much as Tesla sells models with different ranges. He also said the car, which will use a motor at each axle, could likely get to over 200 mph, although the production vehicle will have its speed limited.

Under the name Atieva, the company has released video of its test mule van, which it calls Edna. This van uses the dual motor system, with total horsepower adding to 1,200, although for stability reasons that amount has been restricted to 900 horsepower. Still, it gets to 60 mph in 2.69 seconds. Rawlinson says that the sedan will weigh about 1,000 pounds less and have much better aerodynamics, so is likely to be even quicker.

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