Top Articles of 2024, #9: Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk Invest Billions in North Carolina Manufacturing

The #9 most clicked article of 2024: Striving to meet the booming market demand for GLP-1 drugs, Lilly and Novo Nordisk are adding injectables manufacturing capacity—and around 1,600 jobs combined—in the cities of Concord and Clayton, NC

Novo Nordisk, Clayton, North Carolina, US. New production facilities announced 24 June 2024. To be completed in 2027-2029.
Novo Nordisk, Clayton, North Carolina, US. New production facilities announced 24 June 2024. To be completed in 2027-2029.
Novo Nordisk

Both Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk have invested in GLP-1 injectables manufacturing sites, with more capacity on the way.

With a ribbon-cutting ceremony and tour on June 14, 2024, Lilly showed off its newest manufacturing plant in Concord, NC, designed to help relieve manufacturing bottlenecks for injectable GLP-1 drugs Mounjaro and Zepbound. The company doubled its initial investment in the facility from $1 billion to $2 billion. At full capacity, the plant will employ approximately 600 people, with around 400 positions filled thus far. 

The 1 million-plus square foot facility, set to start production in 2025, is part of a broader strategy to meet high market demand, which current facilities aren’t able to fulfill. The Concord plant—located at the old Phillip Morris manufacturing site—was completed in two years due to streamlined FDA collaboration and advanced robotic manufacturing technologies.

Anjalee Khemlani reports that the company has either identified or started building seven new facilities, investing $18 billion into the strategy, per executive vice president Edgardo Hernandez. 

Continue to the full article here.

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