Last Updated on: 11th June 2025, 10:34 am
Slate Auto, which is partially backed by Jeff Bezos, could be described as the anti-Tesla company. Where Tesla builds electric cars that are packed with every imaginable electronic geegaw, Slate is building electric trucks that are as simple as possible. Oh, customers can gussy them up if they want to, but the basic vehicle is as bare bones as anything short of a Japanese kei car. Unless the customer wants to pay to have the vehicle wrapped at the factory, it goes out the door with unpainted gray polypropylene panels that are dent-proof, rust proof, and have all the style and grace of a water heater.
What is interesting, for those of you who like word games, is that Slate is an anagram of Tesla. Is that deliberate? Who knows, but it would fit nicely with the idea that Slate is the anti-Tesla. In fact, in its own way, it is just as much of a market disrupter as the Cybertruck — a vehicle that smashes the mold and creates an entirely new type of electric truck. Where the Cybertruck weighs nearly 7,000 pounds and has a 122.4 kWh battery, the Slate truck weighs a featherlight — relatively speaking — 3600 pounds and comes standard with a 52.7 kWh battery. (An 84.3 battery is optional.)
In some respects, the Slate truck is closer to the original Scout vehicles from International Harverster — tough, rugged, no nonsense vehicles with few frills — than the vehicles from Volkswagen’s Scout division. Slate is an honest truck at an honest price. It is meant to do what trucks are supposed to do, not act as a bauble for rich people to add to their charm bracelets.
Inside The Slate Mini Factory
Recently, CNBC‘s Michael Wayland visited the Slate factory in Orion Township, Michigan, to learn more about Slate and its new electric pickup truck. What he found was a bunch of prototypes and pre-production test vehicles being put through their places. Those vehicles are bare bones electric pickup trucks with two seats and two doors that are being hand built. A small prototype assembly line is in use as well. There is a lot of testing and validation needed before any vehicles get built for customers.
To my eye, the Slate pickup echoes the look of the second-generation Ford Courier that was in production until 1985 — an endearing small pickup truck for those who didn’t need to pull a four-stall horse trailer or deliver a ton of cinder blocks to a job site. Slate customers who want to pay a little more than the estimated $25,000 base price can add kits that can convert the Slate into a five-seat fastback or squared-off truck similar to a Jeep Wrangler. Readers may recall that the full-size Ford Bronco, like the one OJ drove, had a hard cover that could be removed to make it more like a pickup truck. Not easy to do, but possible.
Simplify, Simplify, Simplify
Wayland writes that Slate believes it can succeed where others have failed through simplifying the manufacturing process and lowering costs. “This one’s going to be different for a number of reasons,” said Eric Keipper, the head of engineering for Slate. “We took the back-to-basics, only-the-essentials approach, and, really, we’re building a completely new category of product.” The Slate production facility is being built at a former printing plant in Warsaw, Indiana, which is expected to have capacity of up to 150,000 vehicles a year.
He says the way Slate plans to go about manufacturing its vehicles will allow it to get them into production with far less capital outlay than is normal for a new company just getting started in the business.
“We are building the affordable vehicle that has long been promised but never been delivered, but with a twist, It’s a vehicle people are actually going to love and be proud to own,” Barman said at an April reveal event. The company says the Slate will be “a radically simple, radically affordable, radically personalizable car.” Part of that is down to using many off-the-shelf parts from suppliers, which cost far less than custom made components. Connectivity is de-emphasized, which cuts across the grain of what is now considered normal in the car industry. There is a small information screen and drivers will use their own digital devices for navigation and entertainment. Speakers are an extra cost option.
Way back at the start of the automotive era, a sports car was defined as a vehicle that had an engine, transmission, four wheels and at least one seat. The motto was that anything that did not make the car faster was not needed. Windows, heaters, wipers? Piffle! Who needs that stuff? The Slate is carrying that time honored tradition forward to offer customers a no-nonsense electric pickup.
Unlimited Customization
Buyers can gussy it up if they want to, but it comes ready to use straight from the factory, no need to add stuff that’s not needed to get the job done. One of those add-ons is vehicle wrapping. The exterior of the Slate is made of plastic panels, the kind Saturn pioneered in the late ’80s. The material is gray, so every Slate that leaves the factory will be gray unless the buyer chooses to have it wrapped, which can be done by the buyer or a local company after delivery.
There’s a good reason for this. A modern paint shop, that complies with all environmental regulations, can cost upwards of a billion dollars. Slate doesn’t have to spend the money on a painting facility, which will help keep the price of its vehicles down.
The Slate truck will ship with a standard 52.7 kWh battery that has an estimated range of 150 miles, or a 84.3 kWh pack with a range of 240 miles. The batteries will be sourced from SK On, according to the company. Top speed is given as 90 miles per hour, and frankly, if you need a truck that goes faster than that, you shouldn’t even be considering a Slate.
Is Slate Viable?
Slate is getting started at a time when challenges abound. Trucks with just two doors and seats? Who does that today? The EV Revolution is not gathering speed as quickly as many had hoped in the US, thank in large measure to regulatory uncertainty about federal tax credits and a pigheaded opposition to anything that smacks of environmental action by the failed administration of the current president.
“They have an interesting idea,” Stephanie Brinley, associate director in AutoIntelligence at S&P Global Mobility, told Waykland. “The question is, how many people really want to do that much themselves, and how big is the adjustable market? Just like every other startup before it, their sustainability is not going to be determined by the first product in the first six months. The first product just gets you in the door. It’s modular. It’s cool. It’s a really clever idea. The question for me comes down to how many people want to do that? And we’ll find out, but I don’t know that it’s as high as they think it is.”
Tim Kuniskis, CEO of the Ram brand at Stellantis, said, “I think it’s super interesting. The idea behind it, we’ve talked about that idea a million times. Now, what’s it going to actually transact at in the marketplace … when people start to option them up, it’s not going to be $20,000. It’s going to be $35,000, and by the time you get to $35,000, you’re in midsize truck territory. ”
Karl Brauer of iSeeCars.com was more direct. “Slate is an example of why and how hard it is to produce a cheap EV. They are producing an electric vehicle with only two seats, 140-mile range, manual windows, no touchscreen, and it’s still $27,500 … To me, it’s not a competitive vehicle at that point.”
The takeaway here is that there are a lot of naysayers talking down Slate. What we are interested in, though, is what our readers think. I have my own thoughts, but want to hear what you have to say first.
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