Lucid Global Supply Manager Jaeri Kim announced late Monday that she is relocating from California to China, while being promoted to Senior Global Supply Manager.
Kim is not the first to work for the California-headquartered brand based on the world’s largest EV market, according to the LinokedIn profiles of other China-based employees.
Lucid employs staff across Shanghai and Jiangsu province in supply chain, procurement, supplier quality, battery engineering and information technology, according to public professional profiles reviewed by EV on Tuesday.
The head of the operation describes his responsibilities as “Supply Chain Development in Asia, Lucid China office operation.”
Lucid‘s Form 10-K for 2025, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on February 24, does not indicate a specific number of how many employees based in China.
“And now, onto Shanghai! I’m excited to experience one of the world’s biggest manufacturing and logistics hubs firsthand,” Lucid’s Senior Global Supply Manager Jaeri Kim wrote in a public post on LinkedIn.
Her professional profile lists her as a Global Supply Manager in Newark, California from August 2025, and as a Senior Global Supply Manager in Shanghai from August 2026.
What She Worked On
Kim wrote on LinkedIn that she started out focused on parcel shelves, load floors, floor mats and subtrunks, and later worked on main carpet, floor carpet, noise-vibration-harshness components and trunk insulators “across the Air, Gravity, and Midsize programs.”
Lucid‘s previous CFO Taoufiq Boussaid said late last year that Cosmos would draw part of its bill of materials from China.
She had worked on Lucid vehicles before joining.
Her profile records two years at Hyundai Transys in Fremont, California, from September 2023, describing work “on two projects of LUCID, Air (sedan) and Gravity (SUV)” and reporting weekly to the supplier’s chief operating officer and a Lucid VP while managing five to ten tier-two and tier-three suppliers.
Hyundai Transys confirmed the relationship publicly in July 2023, when it said it would apply seat know-how accumulated “through the development of seats with American electric vehicle companies, Rivian Automotive and Lucid Motors.”
What the Filing Says
The human capital section states that as of December 31, 2025 the company had approximately 9,000 employees globally,
Back then, Lucid said they were “primarily based at our headquarters in Newark, California, at our regional headquarters in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, at our satellite locations in Southfield, Michigan and Phoenix, Arizona, at our EV manufacturing facilities in Casa Grande, Arizona, and King Abdullah Economic City, Saudi Arabia, and at our retail stores and service centers throughout the U.S. and Canada, Europe, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates.”
Phoenix was added to that list this year but China was not mentioned.
The word appears elsewhere in the 2025 filing only in regulatory contexts — a reference to jurisdictions including China implementing autonomous vehicle regulation, and to the US Bureau of Industry and Security Connected Vehicles Rule.
The Office She Is Joining
Jay Zhu, based in Shanghai’s Putuo district, lists his title as Head of Supply Chain and Business Operation Asia.
His profile puts his tenure at Lucid at three years and four months, dating the relationship to roughly April 2023.
His role has narrowed toward sourcing over time.
He was Head of Product from May 2023, covering “China market strategy, product management, market intelligence,” then Head of Business Development and Operation from May 2025, covering “China Market Strategy, supply chain exploration, business operation,” before taking the Asia supply chain role in November 2025.
Other staff appear across the region.
A battery technical project manager is based in Shanghai’s Jiading district, having joined in December 2025 from Volvo Cars, where he spent more than five years, and CATL before that.
A manager for global supply and procurement is in Songjiang district, joining in August 2025 after six years at Human Horizons, the company behind the HiPhi brand.
A supplier quality engineer is listed in Shanghai, a supplier industrialisation and quality engineer in Changzhou, Jiangsu, and an infrastructure operations engineer in Shanghai.
One profile lists an electrical engineer at Atieva, the legal name under which Lucid operated before its 2021 listing and which remains its corporate identity in certain filings.
Why Now
Lucid states that its sourcing plans use a qualification process assessing “technical capability, quality, cost, applicable tariffs, footprint,” and that it works closely with suppliers “while aiming to reduce exposure to tariffs.”
The company has recently delayed production of Cosmos to the second half of 2027 at its Saudi plant.
Chief executive Silvio Napoli is running a cash improvement programme targeting roughly $1.4 billion this year, of which $600 million to $800 million is meant to come from inventory savings.
Sourcing from China
Taoufiq Boussaid, then chief financial officer, told the UBS Conference in December that building the Midsize in Saudi Arabia lets the company source from China without paying US duties.
“We found ourselves in a fortunate space having the option to manufacture a car in KSA,” he said, referring to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. “And what it does is that it allows us basically to import from China part of the bill of material without having to incur the significant duty.”
He said Chinese-sourced components extend beyond batteries to “many other equipments,” without specifying which, and that the arrangement suited the programme’s timetable.
“For the time being and given the time frame that we have to get this car ready, we find ourselves in a very comfortable spot being able to import this bill of material,” Boussaid stated back then.
He also acknowledged it was a response to circumstance rather than a plan.
“We didn’t obviously looked at it that way before we find out about all the implication that the shifting policy had in terms of impact, in terms of tariffs and so forth,” the then-CFO said, adding that for the time being it was the best option and that “things might change over time.”
Lucid announced Boussaid’s departure on July 2 as part of a leadership overhaul, saying he would leave following a handover to his successor and support the company through its second-quarter results. Alexander De Bock succeeded him.
The company has not said whether the sourcing strategy Boussaid described last December has changed.
No Disclosure of China Details
Lucid‘s proxy statement, filed in April, states that as of December 31, 2025 its employee population was approximately 9,000 excluding the chief executive, of which about 88% were in the United States and 12% outside it.
The 12% cover about 1,080 people, unallocated across Saudi Arabia, Europe, Canada, the United Arab Emirates and any other location.
Not a New Ambition
Lucid advertised 14 Shanghai-based roles in December 2022, spanning hardware engineering, supply chain, retail, logistics, digital and legal.
Three were explicitly localisation-focused, including a senior product manager for China introduction and product managers for public and residential charging in China. Coverage at the time read the postings as preparation for market entry.
No China launch followed.
The company sells vehicles in North America, Europe and the Middle East, and its annual report describes plans to expand through importer, dealer and agent arrangements without naming China as a target.
