Eli Lilly Invests Additional $5.3b for Production of Diabetes, Obesity Drugs in Indiana
Overview
Eli Lilly will spend an additional $5.3 billion to build a massive API complex, close to home in Lebanon, Indiana. This brings total investment in the 600-acre campus (rendering above) to $9 billion, making it the largest outlay in United States history for synthetic medicine API manufacturing, Lilly CEO David Ricks said. (Eli Lilly) Since scoring approval two years ago for its next-generation diabetes treatment Mounjaro (tirzepatide), Eli Lilly has been playing catch up with market leader Novo Nordisk.
Additional Investment
- On Friday, the Indianapolis-based drugmaker revealed its plan to take a giant leap in the race, as it will invest an additional $5.3 billion to build a massive manufacturing complex, 30 miles away in Lebanon, Indiana.
- The expenditure will boost production of active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) for its injected tirzepatide products Mounjaro, for type 2 diabetes, and Zepbound, for obesity, Lilly said.
David Ricks on This Development
- The announcement comes as Lilly and its Danish rival scale up in an effort to meet the overwhelming demand for their blood sugar modulating products.
- Lilly’s new financing brings total investment in its 600-acre campus to $9 billion, making it the largest outlay in United States history for synthetic medicine API manufacturing, CEO David Ricks said in a statement.
- “Importantly, we are investing in our home state of Indiana, creating high-wage, advanced manufacturing, engineering and science jobs for hundreds of current and future Hoosier families,” Ricks, a graduate of nearby Purdue University, added in a release.
Future Jobs & Manufacturing
- When it is complete, the complex will employ 900 workers. The project also will provide more than 5,000 construction jobs.
- Construction kicked off last year in the LEAP Research and Innovation District.
- Lilly expects to begin manufacturing products at the facility in 2026 with the scale up continuing through 2028.
Lilly’s Manufacturing Facilities
- Since 2020, Lilly said that it has committed more than $16 billion to develop new manufacturing facilities in the U.S. and Europe.
- Those sites are in Limerick, Ireland; Alzey, Germany; Concord, N.C. and at the Raleigh/Durham Research Triangle Park, N.C.
- The $2.5 billion plant in Germany is expected to begin production in 2027. Lilly also projects the Research Triangle facility to become fully operational in 2027.
Further Investment to Expand Manufacturing Capability
- Additionally, the company has invested $1.2 billion to upgrade and expand its manufacturing capability at the Lilly Technology Center in Indianapolis.
- Last month, Lilly also purchased an 84,000-square-foot facility in Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin, for an undisclosed sum from Nexus Pharmaceuticals.
- Lilly expects the injectable drug factory to be updated and ready for operations in late 2025.
Company Sales
- In the first quarter of this year, Mounjaro generated $1.8 billion in sales, which was triple its haul from the first quarter of 2023, while Zepbound accounted for $517 million in sales in its first full quarter on the market.
- Meanwhile, Novo Nordisk’s older GLP-1 drugs outsold Lilly’s by better than 2 to 1 as type 2 diabetes treatment Ozempic pulled in $4.3 billion and obesity medicine Wegovy reached $1.3 billion in sales.
- In its attempt to scale up, Novo has made a bold move, paying $11 billion up front for three Catalent fill-finish facilities.
While Novo remains in the lead based on total GLP-1 sales, the momentum is on the side of Lilly. Last month, GlobalData projected that Mounjaro will overtake Ozempic as the industry’s top blood sugar-modulating treatment, with sales reaching a staggering $34 billion by 2029.
Sales: 2023
In 2023, Novo increased sales by 31% while Lilly's were up 20%. Of the industry's top 20 drugmakers by revenue, Novo and Lilly were the only companies with double-digit sales increases last year, demonstrating the remarkable impact weight loss drugs have had on the market.
