Stellantis has found a buyer for a plant it hasn’t used in nearly three years, and that buyer doesn’t make cars. On Nov. 9, Stellantis and Roshel, a Brampton-based armored-vehicle maker, announced an asset purchase agreement. Under it, Roshel takes over Brampton Assembly Plant and its equipment for an undisclosed price. The automaker’s SEC filing says the deal should close by the end of 2026, subject to government and regulatory conditions.
Unifor’s answer came the same day. “Stellantis has betrayed our members with an underhanded deal to sell the plant and walk away from its commitments to our members,” National President Lana Payne said in the union’s response.
How a retooling turned into a sale
Brampton wasn’t shut down for lack of work. In its 2022 investment announcement, Stellantis said it would retool the plant starting in 2024 with a new, flexible architecture built for electrification. It promised at least one all-new electric model, production restarting in 2025 and three shifts.
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Unifor’s August statement lays out what happened next. The plant was idled in December 2023 to retool for the Jeep Compass. In February 2025, the retooling was paused. In October 2025, future Compass production went to the United States, and the plant was idled indefinitely. On Aug. 12, 2026, Stellantis told the union it wanted to talk to another company about a sale. The union says more than 2,200 members of Local 1285 have been on layoff since December 2023.
So this plant didn’t die of old age. It was idled for a retool that never finished, then put up for sale.
Why Stellantis wants out
The filing doesn’t hide the math. Stellantis says the sale supports its FaSTLAne 2030 strategy, which targets about 80% capacity utilization across North America by 2030. An empty assembly plant drags that number down even with nobody working in it. Selling it removes the capacity from the books entirely, which helps the utilization figure without building a single extra Jeep.
CEO Antonio Filosa framed it as responsibility: “After three years of paid layoff, we remain committed to working with Unifor on a fair resolution.” The filing says Stellantis acknowledges its obligations under the collective agreement and is ready to negotiate a settlement for union-represented employees. In other words, it’s offering a severance negotiation, not a new product.
Who is buying
According to the filing, Roshel designs and builds armored vehicles: MRAPs, APCs, medical evacuation, recovery and counter-drone variants. It processes its own ballistic steel and makes its own transparent armor, drivetrain integration included. More than 2,500 of its vehicles have been deployed to Ukraine. The two companies also say they’ll explore working together on vehicle technologies and defence services.
That’s a real manufacturer, but a very different kind of plant. Armored-vehicle work is low-volume and labor-heavy, with production paced by government contracts. A mass-production auto plant depends on high, steady volume and a supplier network to feed it. Unifor’s Vito Beato called Roshel’s prospects “hundreds of hypothetical jobs” tied to military contracts that “haven’t even been awarded yet.” Neither company has said how many people Roshel will hire.
The legal fight
Unifor has two arguments. The first is contractual. The union says its collective agreement requires “no less than one-year’s notice of any such closure or sale,” and that Stellantis never gave formal written notice of closure. The union also argues the Compass move broke commitments Stellantis made in exchange for significant federal and provincial funding.
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The second argument is local zoning, and it’s the more interesting one. Unifor says Brampton City Council voted unanimously in February to rezone the site for automotive assembly and related automotive manufacturing. The union is now asking Mayor Patrick Brown and Premier Doug Ford to enforce that designation. The open question is whether an armored truck built on a vehicle chassis counts as “automotive manufacturing.” Lawyers could argue that one for a long time, and it may decide whether the regulatory conditions in the filing turn into real obstacles.
What it means for drivers
Nothing changes in your driveway. Brampton hasn’t built a vehicle since December 2023, and Stellantis says it still employs more than 10,000 people in Canada at Windsor Assembly, Etobicoke Casting, its Windsor R&D center and its CpK operations.
Once an assembly plant is converted to something else, it’s very hard to turn back into one. If the deal closes, Canada loses one of its few car assembly plants, and in a tariff fight with Washington, that leaves Ottawa holding a weaker hand. Does a plant that builds armored trucks still count as car-making capacity, or did Canada just lose one of its assembly plants?
Images Via: Wikipedia