2 factories, 107 jobs paying $18 to $22 an hour, headed for Indy

An Italian auto-parts maker and a New York foam-products manufacturer plan to set up operations in Marion County.

Italian-owned OMR North America wants to build a $15 million factory in Speedway and hire 60 people at an average wage of $18 an hour. The five-acre site at 1101 Main Street will become OMR’s North American headquarters. The company makes auto parts used in engines, suspensions, braking systems and elsewhere.

In a request for a property tax abatement filed with the Department of Metropolitan Development, OMR said it would spend $2.5 million to build a 44,000-square-foot building on the vacant site and install $12.5 million worth of manufacturing equipment.

The site was once home to an Allison Transmission factory, which was demolished in 2005. The town of Speedway acquired the land in 2011.

OMR is a division of the Italian firm Officine Meccaniche Rezzatesi.

A St. Johnsville, N.Y., manufacturer, Opflex Technologies, also plans to move its headquarters to Indianapolis, to the Western Select industrial complex at 2525 N. Shadeland Ave.

Opflex will lease 50,000 square feet inside the former Western Electric complex and spend $2 million in equipment and building improvements to make foam products for sports equipment, gaskets, packaging and environmental remediation. It plans to hire 47 people by 2019, paying an average wage of $22 an hour.

Opflex also is asking the city for property tax abatement.

Call Star reporter Jeff Swiatek at (317) 444-6483. Follow him on Twitter: @JeffSwiatek.