Pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly is pouring $1 billion into expanding its Limerick, Ireland manufacturing site. The bump in funding is intended to increase production of biologic active ingredients, including those for its recently approved treatment for early symptomatic Alzheimer’s disease. At the same time, the company debuted its new $800 million facility expansion in Kinsale, Ireland, which has been making medicines since last year to meet demand for Lilly’s latest diabetes and obesity treatments.
This additional investment is part of the most ambitious manufacturing expansion agenda in the company’s history. Since 2020, Lilly has committed more than $20 billion to build, expand and acquire manufacturing facilities in the U.S. and Europe.
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Once complete, Limerick will join Lilly’s global manufacturing network producing the biologic active ingredients for the company’s Alzheimer’s disease portfolio and other biologic medicines.
Today’s announcement brings Lilly’s total Limerick investment to $2 billion, doubling the investment the company announced in March 2023. Advanced technologies such as machine learning, AI and automated robotics and systems at the site will enable right-first-time execution, all in support of the safe and reliable supply of medicines. As a part of this expansion, Lilly will create another 150 jobs for highly skilled workers in Limerick such as engineers, scientists, quality assurance professionals and operations personnel, for a total of 450 employees. Lilly initially announced the Limerick site in 2022 and broke ground in March 2023. Production of biologic active ingredients for Lilly medicines is on track to start in 2026.
The Limerick investment project is subject to planning approval, and the company will submit a planning application to the Limerick City and County Council in due course.
The official opening of Lilly’s Kinsale manufacturing site expansion marks the completion of the state-of-the-art project to help meet the demand for current and future treatments. The site employs a digital-first process that integrates continuous manufacturing technology to create a new manufacturing platform for creating complex peptides. This facility was recently recognized as the winner of the Innovation category in the prestigious “Facility of the Year” awards program run by the International Society of Pharmaceutical Engineers.
Lilly’s Global Business Solutions center in Cork has quadrupled employment levels since 2019, with more than 2,000 employees expected by the end of 2024, over half of whom are working in clinical research and development.