Slate Auto's Warsaw Plant: A New Labor Competitor and a Major New Grid Load

Slate Auto, a Michigan-based EV startup, is taking over the former R.R. Donnelly printing complex at 2801 West Old Road 30 in Warsaw, 1.4 million square feet, more than 2,000 jobs targeted, and up to 150,000 vehicles per year once fully ramped, with initial manufacturing planned for late 2026. For manufacturers already competing for welders, maintenance technicians, electricians, and production supervisors across northern Indiana, that ramp directly tightens the skilled labor pool and will push wages higher. On the power side, a 1.4-million-square-foot EV assembly operation with paint lines, compressed air, battery conditioning, and thermal management adds a serious new industrial load to the local system, one that influences substation plans and transformer loading in that corridor for years.