Faith Technologies is gearing up for a massive new build-out in south Olathe that would turn former farmland into a sprawling manufacturing complex and crank up truck traffic along the 167th Street and Lone Elm Road corridor.
The company is proposing roughly 1.3 to 1.4 million square feet of new single-story manufacturing space next to its existing Excellerate campus as part of a long-term expansion plan.
The Olathe Planning Commission has already signed off on the key first step. Commissioners unanimously recommended rezoning for what the city is calling Hedge Industrial Park East and approved a preliminary site plan that staff said would allow more than 1.4 million square feet of single-story warehouse and manufacturing space on roughly 126 acres, according to City of Olathe planning documents.
Faith Technologies, headquartered in Menasha, Wisconsin, already operates its Excellerate manufacturing hub at 21800 W. 167th St. The company opened an initial roughly 442,000-square-foot plant in 2019 and later added an about 438,000-square-foot building next door, bringing the campus close to a million square feet, per Faith Technologies.
Now the company is looking to stack on even more. Local business reporting says Faith is planning three new single-story manufacturing buildings totaling roughly 1.4 million square feet near that same site, part of a push to scale up production of modular electrical gear used by hyperscale data centers, according to Kansas City Business Journal. The new-build footprint would land in the same 167th and Lone Elm area where the Excellerate operations already sit.
Traffic, Trucks and Buffers
City staff and local coverage point out that this is not a light-traffic kind of project. The expansion would ship large, climate-controlled modules by tractor-trailer and would require expanded pavement, a new collector road and other improvements to absorb the heavy truck volumes. Plans also include truck docking, overhead doors and general stormwater mitigation, as reported by The Kansas City Star.
In other words, more jobs and investment for Olathe, more semis for anyone living or driving near 167th and Lone Elm.
Tax Breaks and Jobs
On a separate track, Faith Technologies has also sought financial help for an office component on the campus. The company applied for industrial revenue bonds and a tax phase-in to support a 76,800-square-foot office building. City staff described a single-series bond package and included projections about job creation. The bond application and council packet lay out the schedule for public hearings along with the city’s cost-benefit analysis, per City of Olathe council materials.
For now, the approvals clear the way for phased construction but stop short of a public construction start date. Final site plans, building permits and utility work all have to fall into place before any dirt moves. If it all proceeds, the expansion would further cement Olathe’s role in the region’s manufacturing and data-center supply chain, even as questions linger about traffic, paving and neighborhood buffers as the project rolls into the permitting phase.
