Eli Lilly and Company taps Durham for 450+ jobs, new facility
Eli Lilly and Company plans to bring more than 462 jobs to a new Durham County facility. The drug giant picked Durham County for a $474 million investment over competing sites in both Indiana and Pennsylvania. The announcement was made Tuesday.
Eli Lilly (NYSE: LLY) is planning what’s being described as an integrated life science manufacturing facility, one that will provide both drug formulation and filling as well as final packaging of both marketed and late-stage pipeline candidates.
The jobs come with average annual wages of about $73,000. Durham County’s average wage for private sector jobs was $71,756 in 2019.
Specifically, the project includes manufacturing operations for two diabetes treatments: Trulicity, an injectable approved in 2014, and Tirzepatide, an in-development drug targeted toward those diabetes patients with increased heart disease risk.
If the firm meets all its investment and job milestones, it could mean $8.7 million in state incentives, not including an additional $1.2 million in community college training and another $2.6 million being offered by Durham County.
Right now, the company, headquartered in Indianapolis, has 135 existing remote workers in North Carolina as part of its sales team. To qualify for incentives, the firm will not have to retain those jobs, as it’s been determined that their function “are separate and distinct from the activities proposed at the site of the project,” according to a Commerce briefing. Hiring will start this year. Lilly employs 33,000 people worldwide with more than 7,700 employees in research and development alone.
The project was disclosed at a specially-called meeting of the Economic Investment Committee, part of the North Carolina Department of Commerce. An official announcement is expected later Tuesday at the North Carolina Biotechnology Center.
[Originally posted by Triangle Business Journal — Jan 21, 2020]