Don Stewart was named president of Toyota North Carolina and region 7 group vice president in May 2025, following a three-year tenure as plant operations lead and vice president of manufacturing at Toyota’s newest plant in North America.

Toyota North Carolina is the company’s first in-house battery manufacturing plant outside of Japan. As president, Stewart oversees the construction and start of production of the $13.9 billion investment. Once fully operational, the plant will employ approximately 5,100 North Carolinians and feature 14 production lines that will deliver lithium-ion batteries for hybrid electric, plug-in hybrid electric, and battery electric vehicles.

Under his leadership, Stewart oversees all areas of site construction and battery manufacturing, including the development of innovative workforce training initiatives, emergency preparedness planning and community response, team member safety and security, onsite fire brigade, production, engineering, human resources, and maintenance.

Stewart joined Toyota in 1997 as a maintenance group leader at Toyota Motor Manufacturing West Virginia (Toyota West Virginia) in Buffalo, West Virginia. From there, he was promoted to maintenance manager, the first of many promotions and assignments he would undertake in his 20-year career at Toyota West Virginia. In 2018, Stewart accepted a dispatch position with Hino Motor Manufacturing as vice president of Manufacturing Support. He returned to Toyota in 2021 as a vice president of production engineering, overseeing the Powertrain Division.

Stewart is an alumnus of West Virginia University Institute of Technology, where he received bachelor’s degrees in civil and mechanical engineering. In 2019, he earned a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the University of Charleston, and in 2025, Stewart graduated from the University of Wisconsin with a master’s degree in engineering. Stewart is a veteran of the United States Army, having served in the Ranger Battalion, is a graduate of the U.S. Army’s Sniper School, and a former US Army Sniper School instructor. He currently serves on the board of the Army Sniper Association.

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