A Silicon Valley startup is trying to rival Tesla with an electric sedan - here's a first look at its car

We finally got a glimpse of the electric car start-up Atieva is building to rival Tesla.

Recode's Mark Harris retrieved the image via a public records request to the state of California. There's not too much we can glean from the photo, other than the fact that it's an electric sedan, which is still noteworthy at a time automakers are turning their attention to electric SUVs.

Atieva has released a series of videos showing off its tech in a van dubbed Edna, the most recent of which showed it was able to accelerate to 60 mph in 2.74 seconds.

The documents obtained from Harris also show Atieva's manufacturing facility is Dayang Motorcycle, which is located in the city of Luoyang, China. Dayang Motorcycle is an electric motorbike and scooter company.

Atieva told Chinese reporters in September that it was working on an electric car with independent front and rear electric motors that could accelerate to 62 mph in less than 3 seconds, according to the Recode report.

Atieva executives said in an interview with Reuters that it was planning to release its electric premium sedan on the road in 2018, with luxury crossovers slated to arrive in 2020 or 2021.

Atieva was started in California by former executives from Tesla and Oracle. The start-up's chief technology officer, Peter Rawlinson, is a former lead engineer for Tesla's Model S.

Chinese billionaire Jia Yueting, the founder of Chinese internet company LeEco, has invested in Atieva. Yueting is also an investor in electric car start-up Faraday Future.

LeEco recently raised $1.08 billion to develop its electric car, Bloomberg reported in September. The company has revealed its electric concept car, the LeSEE, which has a top speed of 130 mph and autonomous capabilities.

Faraday Future also unveiled its electric concept car with a top speed of more than 200 mph at the Consumer Electronics Show in January. Faraday Future is building its manufacturing plant in Nevada.