Global technology company SLB will establish manufacturing operations in a former General Motors assembly plant in Shreveport, Louisiana, the governor’s office announced last month.
SLB signed a seven-year lease agreement with the Shreveport Business Park to convert 1 million square feet of the plant, which has stood empty since 2012, into a new facility for digital infrastructure-related products. Renovations are expected to be completed in early 2024, with production slated to begin in 2026.
The Texas-based company’s $18.5 million investment is expected to create nearly 600 direct jobs with an annual payroll of more than $50 million over the next three years. Louisiana Economic Development anticipates the project will create a total of 1,345 jobs in the Northwest region, according to the governor’s office.
“It’s hard to express just how much the former GM plant means to the people of northwest Louisiana,” Gov. John Bel Edwards said in a statement. “SLB’s investment will breathe new life into this once-thriving business park and provide hundreds of new, high-paying jobs for our state’s skilled manufacturing workers.”
Louisiana hit its highest level of manufacturing employment since before the pandemic last year with more than 134,000 jobs, the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis reported, with Edwards stating that SLB’s investment is evidence of that momentum continuing in the years to come.
The state offered SLB an incentive package including access to the state’s workforce training program LED FastStart, and a $4.5 million performance-based grant for infrastructure improvements continent on the company meeting its employment targets, the governor’s office said.
Recruitment for the new positions will start in the coming weeks.
“LED and its nationally recognized workforce development program FastStart will be an important partner in helping us to find and train the skilled workforce that will make this project a success,” SLB’s VP of Industry Affairs for North America Brice Miller said in a statement.
Other manufacturers are also benefiting from states’ workforce programs. EV battery maker SK Battery America exceeded its hiring goal for two Georgia facilities years ahead of schedule by partnering with a job training initiative through the state’s technical college system.
