Electric vehicle manufacturer Canoo announced Wednesday it will be acquiring a new facility in Oklahoma City.

The company said the new facility, “strategically located with easy access to road and rail,” is expected to employ more than 500 people and produce up to 20,000 units by the end of next year, according to a media release.

Canoo did not provide an address for the factory at the time of the announcement, but did say the site encompassed more than 120 acres.

Real estate agents told The Oklahoman the new plant will be located at 9528 W Interstate 40 Service Road, where a former Terex telehandler facility stood before it closed in early 2022 and moved production to Mexico.

Originally built in 1972, the facility in the southeast corner of I-40 and Morgan Road includes a main 500,000-square-foot building, a 12,000-square-foot training center and a 37,000-square-foot office space.

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Canoo executives said the campus will be adapted to accommodate a vehicle assembly line with innovative robotics, a paint shop and an upfitting center, powered by clean energy.

“The Oklahoma City facility has significant room for expansion and is a proven location for large scale production, with an established transportation ecosystem, including rail,” Canoo CEO Tony Aquila said in a statement Wednesday. “We are working with our third-party manufacturing partners to achieve SOP on our own equipment this month.”

Canoo already has one facility in progress at MidAmerica Industrial Park in Pryor, and Aquila said opening a new plant in Oklahoma City is part of an ongoing effort “to bring high-paying light-blue collar jobs” to the state.

The CEO also said Canoo “considered multiple potential sites” before ultimately choosing the Oklahoma City location. In a statement shared on Twitter, Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt said city officials “have been in conversations with Canoo for a couple of years.”

“We are very excited about the potential of this announcement,” Holt said in the statement. “We welcome this opportunity and look forward to building a partnership that brings electric vehicle manufacturing and jobs to OKC.”

When asked about possible incentives for the company from the city, Oklahoma City spokeswoman Kristy Yager said, “We're talking with (Canoo) about incentives, but anything would have to be approved by the city council.”

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Holt and other city officials declined to comment further on Canoo’s plans for the Oklahoma City facility, saying details of the development were under a confidentiality agreement.

Canoo has struggled to launch its operations in Oklahoma. Its Pryor facility was expected to be operational by 2024, but the Tulsa World recently reported it could face delays because of "unfavorable economic conditions."

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The state offered the company $15 million in performance-based cash incentives over the next four years, plus $10 million in assistance to build the facility, with the expectation the company would attract quality jobs and provide a boost to the Oklahoma economy, The Oklahoman previously reported.

"Our incentives in Oklahoma are all performance-based, which means the company has to have to do something in order to qualify for the money," Oklahoma Commerce Department Executive Director Brent Kisling said when the deal was announced. "They don't get funding up front."

In spite of the delays to production, Canoo already has buyers lined up.

Oklahoma agreed to buy up to 1,000 Canoo vehicles as part of the incentive package, paying between $35 million and $50 million for the vehicles over a span of five years, The Oklahoman previously reported.

This summer, Walmart agreed to purchase at least 4,500 of Canoo’s electric vehicles for same-day delivery of its products.

NASA also has announced it will buy three vehicles to transport astronauts, support staff and equipment at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Canoo will provide Crew Transportation Vehicles (CTVs) for NASA's crewed Artemis lunar exploration launches. The all-electric models will be delivered to NASA by June 2023.

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Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt, who won reelection Tuesday, has publicly championed Canoo as part of his own attempts to make Oklahoma more attractive to outside investors and businesses, with hopes of diversifying and boosting the economy.

“Our business-friendly policies and focus on innovation put us ahead of the competition,” Stitt said in July 2021. “Oklahoma is the right place for any manufacturer to locate, and because of our all-of-the-above energy approach in Oklahoma, Canoo chose us.”

Battery production facility opening in Pryor

Canoo announced last Wednesday it also was opening a battery production facility in proximity to its MegaMicro factory already in development at Pryor’s MidAmerica Industrial Park.

Aquila said Canoo’s battery campus in Pryor will be powered by hydroelectricity from the Grand River Dam Authority. The company plans to work with the Cherokee Nation, MidAmerica and other local partners to hire and train workers within the surrounding communities.

The project is expected to employ as many as 2,000 residents upon completion.

Chad Mariska, Oklahoma’s secretary of commerce and workforce development, said in a statement Thursday he was “thrilled” Canoo continues to ramp up production in Oklahoma.

“Through our thoughtful, performance-based incentives as well as the availability of both sites and skilled workforce, Oklahoma maintains our forward momentum in the automotive sector,” Mariska said. “I’d like to thank Canoo leadership for recognizing that Oklahoma is a great place to do business and we look forward to their continued growth.”

Contributing: Senior Business Writer Richard Mize

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This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Electric vehicle manufacturer repurposing OKC facility into plant