POCATELLO, Idaho—When Sean Luangrath joined Pocatello, Idaho-based Inergy Solar a few years ago, the plan was to move the portable solar battery maker to his home base of Salt Lake City so he could build it with easy access to Silicon Slopes’ tech talent and venture capital.
But when the new CEO looked at the labor costs, he ditched that plan and decided instead to rely on labor drawn from local colleges and the nearby Idaho National Laboratory. By next year he plans to double the payroll to 50 employees as he moves the company’s manufacturing operations from China back to eastern Idaho.
