The ones that got away: North Carolina has been wooing automakers for 30 years
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VinFast in NC
Vietnamese automaker VinFast announced in March 2022 that it would open an electric vehicle assembly plant in North Carolina. The battery manufacturing plant will be built in Chatham County and is expected to eventually create 7,500 jobs. It’s the largest economic development announcement in the state’s history. Here is coverage from The News & Observer about the plans.
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For at least three decades, North Carolina legislators have pined after the holy grail of economic expansions: a carmaker.
On Tuesday, they finally succeeded, snagging a Vietnamese startup named VinFast.
“We’ve transitioned from an economy that was based on textiles, furniture and tobacco into one that still has those components but also has a lot of high-tech, has a lot of high-skilled manufacturing,” N.C. House Speaker Tim Moore said at the company’s announcement. “And finally landing an automobile manufacturing facility is indeed a huge achievement for this state. And it’s one that I believe VinFast is going to reap the dividends from as well.”
The 5-year-old company, which is just beginning a foray into international sales, will build a massive manufacturing plant in Moncure, a small community in Chatham County. VinFast hopes to complete the $4 billion factory by July 2024, according to CEO Le Thi Thu Thuy, and expects it to churn out more than 200,000 vehicles a year.
“As a native of this area — I grew up 15 minutes down the road from Siler City, about 25 minutes from Pittsboro —and knowing the hub that Chatham once was for manufacturing and to see us go full circle, you have no idea how exciting this is,” House minority party leader Robert Reives II said at VinFast’s announcement.
“It’s amazing to know that after all of these years of hard work that we’ve been blessed with what is arguably the largest investment in North Carolina history by a private company.”
NC’s long history of hunting carmakers: the 1990s
VinFast evaluated 29 sites in 12 states before narrowing its options to Moncure and a plant near Savannah, Georgia, the state Commerce Department said Tuesday. North Carolina lawmakers and developers were determined not to miss this most recent chance at an auto manufacturer.
“It’s been a lot of years of North Carolina looking for something like this,” Reives told the News & Observer.
In the early 1990s, the state made a major push to attract Mercedez-Benz, which was seeking a site for its first North American assembly plant. The company would have brought about 1,500 jobs and a $300 million investment.
“I think it is on a fast track,” then Gov. Jim Hunt told The News & Observer when asked about Mercedes’ interest in North Carolina.
On Sept. 23, 1993, The Washington Post reported North Carolina’s winning bid for the Mercedes facility, citing anonymous sources.
They were wrong.
“The Mercedes-Benz assembly plant that North Carolina officials have so diligently wooed over the last year is going to Alabama,” the N&O wrote six days later. “Mercedes-Benz represents another near miss for North Carolina economic development recruiters who have made no secret of their desire to land a major automaker.”
Losing Mercedes only stiffened state lawmakers’ resolve to attract a major carmaker.
The 2010s
In the wake of Mercedes’ decision to settle in Alabama, North Carolina revised its approach to economic development. Determined to better entice prospective companies, the state devised a new series of incentives policies, the N&O’s Tyler Dukes, then working for WRAL, reported in 2014.
“If you want to be in the recruiting game today, incentives are part of the deal,” Norris Tolson, who served as the state’s commerce secretary in 1997, told Dukes. “If you don’t have incentives, you are going to lose opportunities. Some of the opportunities you lose you may not even know about.”
New, lucrative incentives may have lured some companies, but carmakers remained elusive. In the 20 years following Mercedes’ move to Alabama, North Carolina missed out on Volkswagen, Audi and Volvo, according to N&O archives.
In 2018, the state missed another would-be boon: Toyota-Mazda. Adding insult to injury, it was again Alabama that came out on top.
“North Carolina put $1.5 billion on the table, but it wasn’t enough to bring the state its first auto assembly plant,” the N&O wrote at the time. “The decision stunned and disappointed those who have been trying for five months to bring the plant to Randolph County.”
The 2020s
The game changed when electric vehicles supplanted gas-powered autos as transportation’s cause célèbre. North Carolina could capitalize on the budding industry’s burgeoning supply chain.
As VinFast establishes its North American presence, ancillary industries may likewise settle in the area.
“This will create opportunities for engineers, technicians and numerous production positions,” Gov. Roy Cooper said at VinFast’s announcement on Tuesday. “But that is just the start as we anticipate this facility will draw vendors and suppliers from far and wide.”
VinFast plans to build the company’s five-passenger VF 8 mid-sized SUV and seven-passenger VF 9 full-size SUV at the plant. The site will eventually produce battery packs as well.
The company is expected to invest more than $4 billion in the plant, which it says will employ at least 7,500 workers by 2027. The jobs will have a minimum average wage of $51,096.
If it meets hiring goals, VinFast will get a state incentives package worth $854 million over 32 years. Chatham County will add $400 million, bringing the total incentive package to more than $1.25 billion.
“For decades, North Carolina has sought to bring auto manufacturing to our state,” Cooper said at VinFast’s announcement. “Well now it’s coming on the wave of clean energy, and it’s been worth the wait.”
This story was originally published March 30, 2022 at 11:38 AM.
