Volkswagen’s Scout Motors Inc. plans to invest $11 million in Detroit. Scout aims to build a new Research and Development (R&D) Center in suburban Detroit, which is expected to create 200 jobs in the area.
Jobs at Scout’s Detroit center are expected to pay an average salary of $3,714 per week plus benefits. The Michigan Strategic Fund board recently approved a $10 million performance-based grant to support Scout’s employment plan.
Scout Motor’s R&D Center in Detroit and its new factory in South Carolina will open simultaneously in 2026. The automaker’s South Carolina facility will produce Scout’s all-electric SUV and pickup truck. The manufacturing facility received $1.29 billion in state incentives earlier this year. According to a Michigan Economic Develop Corp. memo, the Volkswagen-backed company also has a product design and engineering hub planned in Novi, Michigan.
Scout CEO Scott Keogh told Automotive News that the mules for its first electric vehicle will debut by the third quarter of 2024. Scout will launch an all-electric SUV in the United States market. It also plans to release a pickup truck.
“What we are pushing for is what I would call a sort of large B SUV and then a full-size pickup,” Keogh explained. “That’s what we’ll be bringing to the market but certainly there’s opportunities there, and when we have some to announce, we will.”
In March, Scout announced plans to build a $40,000 electric SUV in South Carolina. All the vehicles built in the United States will feature “a newly designed all-electric platform.” Keogh emphasized that Scout vehicles are made for Americans and will not feature VW’s MEB platform used in the ID. Family models.
“This is an AMERICAN truck, and while they can and will share technology, knowledge, and suppliers with their VAG brothers and sisters, this is not a rebranded or variation of anything in the VAG line. Rumors of this being based on the VW skateboard platform are not true,” commented Jeff Bade after talking with the Scout team.
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