In early 2019 General Motors shuttered the Lordstown, OH plant after 52 years of operation making mainly compact cars. The fallout of that decision is something that still weighs heavy on the NE Ohio Region. The story of dwindling manufacturing in the US is a familiar one, which led to little hope for the thousands of newly unemployed working men and women. An unprecedented number of automotive plants across the country have been shut down over the last 10 years. In general, these plants have not found another use and have fallen into disrepair. The loss of the industry and identity was tough for Lordstown, but the loss of the good paying jobs was even harder to overcome.
In early 2019 however, this sad story began to take a turn. It appeared that there may be hope that the plant would be put back into production making automobiles again. The difference being that this time the plant would not be making small cars that are powered by fossil fuels. The Lordstown plant will soon be cranking out state of the art electric pickup trucks for Lordstown Motors.
The newly formed Lordstown Motors had a detailed master plan with a long road ahead of them. They planned to purchase the Lordstown plant from GM and transition the plant into a state-of-the-art production facility for an all new battery electric pickup truck. The beauty of the electric vehicle is that compared to their gas guzzling brethren they are relatively simple to make. Battery, Motor, Frame, Body, Wheels. There are far fewer assembly components for an electric vehicle than a traditional vehicle. Unfortunately, the unspoken truth of manufacturing is that making even the simplest things at scale is extremely difficult. It requires product knowledge, expertise, planning, and an incredible level of execution.
This is the point where GENESYS stepped in.
GENESYS has signed on to help Lordstown Motors overcome the inevitable challenges ahead. We will accomplish this by calling on our experienced team of automation professionals with a combined 300+ years of manufacturing industry knowledge, and leveraging the same type of skilled labor that kept this plant running for so many years. Getting this plant retrofitted and operational for a new vehicle will take thousands of hours and hundreds of skilled hands.
The tide appears to be turning in Lordstown, OH and the jobs are coming back. GENESYS is excited to be a contributor to reviving this mainstay in American manufacturing and helping Ohio regain a piece of the vibrant economy that has been lost in recent years. We are looking forward to engaging the local talent pool to make Lordstown better than ever.
The name badge of the new Lordstown truck is simply “Endurance”, which seems only fitting for this Ohio Car plant and it’s Employees that refuse to quit.
Endurance indeed.