EV startup Slate Auto has hired a manufacturing leader with nearly 15 years of experience across General Motors, Lucid Motors, and Ford Motor Company — as it prepares to begin production of its low-cost electric pickup at a former printing plant in Indiana later this year.
Adam Backhaut joined Slate as Senior Manufacturing Leader this week, according to his updated LinkedIn profile.
He most recently spent one year as Global Manufacturing Engineering Leader at Ford, joining the Dearborn automaker in early 2025 after six years at Lucid.
The hire adds more than a decade of EV manufacturing experience to Slate‘s factory team as the startup races to convert over 160,000 refundable reservations into customer deliveries by the end of the year.
The move is also the second senior poach Slate has made from Lucid in recent weeks, following the hiring of the company’s former Head of North America Sales on April 24.
Last Decade
Backhaut served as Global Manufacturing Operations & Engineering Leader at Lucid Motors from 2019 to 2025 — spending roughly six years at the company’s manufacturing facility in Casa Grande, Arizona.
He led Lucid‘s paint manufacturing operation from the ground up — building the factory and assembling the team to establish full-scale operations.
His tenure covered the launch of the Lucid Air, through its Sapphire performance variant, and the first production units of the Gravity model.
He left Lucid for Ford in early 2025, taking on a Global Manufacturing Engineering role focused on paint materials, process, launch, and quality at Ford’s global headquarters in Dearborn, Michigan.
Backhaut was briefly in China, working in the same area for Seres — an EV venture backed by Huawei — between 2018 and 2019.
He spent six years at General Motors from 2013 to 2019 in global manufacturing engineering for paint materials, facilities, and process in the Greater Detroit Area.
Slate Auto
Michigan-based Slate Auto is developing a two-seat electric pickup priced in the mid-$20,000s.
The company has operated largely in stealth since its founding in 2022 before emerging publicly in April 2025.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is among the company’s backers through his family office.
Earlier this year, the startup closed a $650 million Series C round led by TWG Global — the investment firm run by Guggenheim Partners chief executive Mark Walter and investor Thomas Tull — bringing total funding to roughly $1.4 billion.
Slate plans to produce vehicles at a reindustrialized factory in Warsaw, Indiana — a former printing plant — where it expects to invest nearly $400 million and create more than 2,000 jobs.
At full production, the factory is expected to produce up to 150,000 trucks per year.
The company replaced its CEO in March, bringing in former Amazon executive Peter Faricy to lead the company through production and sales launch.
Co-founder Christine Barman transitioned to the role of president of vehicles.
Slate has also been building out its commercial team, recently hiring a former Lucid North America sales leader as Head of Sales — the second former Lucid employee the startup has pulled in recent weeks.
With preorders opening in June and first customer deliveries targeted for late 2026, Backhaut’s appointment adds a seasoned manufacturing operator to Slate‘s growing factory leadership as the startup enters its most critical phase.
Ford’s Ongoing Restructuring
Backhaut’s brief tenure at Ford coincided with a turbulent period for the Dearborn automaker.
Ford took $19.5 billion in charges in December after restructuring its EV strategy, canceling three planned electric models and ending production of the F-150 Lightning.
The company’s EV unit recorded $4.8 billion in losses for the full year of 2025, and the CFO has said Model e is not expected to turn profitable until 2029.
The restructuring also led to the termination of its BlueOval SK battery partnership and the layoff of 1,600 workers at its Kentucky plant.
Ford is now focused on its Universal EV Platform, which will underpin a $30,000 electric pickup truck from 2027 onwards.
Lucid’s Leadership Exodus
Backhaut’s departure adds to a leadership exodus at Lucid that has now spanned more than two years.
The Saudi-backed EV maker has lost at least 14 C-suite officers, senior vice presidents, and vice presidents since October 2023 — including its CEO, CFO, general counsel, chief engineer, and heads of strategy, software, and supply chain.
Founder-era CEO Peter Rawlinson left in February 2025, triggering a 14-month search that ended earlier this month with the appointment of Silvio Napoli as permanent chief executive.
The most recent departure was Senior Director of Product Management Zach Walker, who left for General Motors ahead of the midsize Cosmos launch.
Despite the turnover, Lucid reached a major production milestone, building its 50,000th vehicle in Casa Grande last month.
The company has guided for production of 25,000 to 27,000 vehicles in 2026 and is preparing to start production of the Cosmos at its Saudi Arabian plant by the end of the year.
The leadership change came alongside a $1.05 billion capital raise and an expanded robotaxi partnership with Uber covering at least 35,000 vehicles.
Despite that, the company’s stock continues to slide, having traded as low as $5.62 last week.