Ousted Luminar CEO Austin Russell wants to buy the company
Austin Russell, the billionaire founder of Luminar, has made a bid to acquire the lidar-maker five months after he was replaced as CEO following an ethics inquiry. The takeover effort was disclosed in an SEC filing by Russell early Friday morning. It would involve his new company, Russell AI Labs, purchasing 100% of the outstanding shares of Luminar’s Class A Common Stock for an undisclosed price. If it happens, Luminar would remain publicly traded, and Russell AI Labs may “acquire a different, larger global automotive technology company” and merge it with Luminar “to create a unified technology platform business (‘Luminar 2.0’),” according to the filing. If that happens, Russell himself may also invest in the newly combined company. The proposal was made on…
