The investment, which will expand Eli Lilly’s existing campus in Puerto Rico, is slated to create 100 new jobs, on top of around 1,000 construction-related roles.
Eli Lilly is continuing to pour money into its domestic footprint with a new $1.2 billion commitment to construct a production facility in Puerto Rico, which the pharma says will form part of its supply chain for the oral weight-loss therapy orforglipron.
Lilly plans to use the investment to “expand and modernize” its existing campus in Puerto Rico, called Lilly del Caribe, the company announced Wednesday. The project will increase the site’s production capacity and fit it with “highly advanced technologies” to improve the manufacturing of oral solid medicines. Aside from obesity, Lilly del Caribe will also put out drugs for cancer, immunology, neuroscience and other cardiometabolic indications.
Construction is expected to start next year and create around 1,000 jobs. The plant is set to be operational in 2028 and will open 100 new high-tech manufacturing positions, Lilly said.
This Puerto Rico site expansion is the third manufacturing project Lilly has detailed since announcing in February that it would pump $27 billion into its domestic supply chain. So far, the pharma has announced a $5 billion facility in Virginia, creating around 2,500 jobs, and another in Texas, worth $6.5 billion and carrying 615 new posts.
Orforglipron has yet to be approved by the FDA, but is one of the frontrunners in what has become a highly competitive oral obesity race. In April, Lilly presented data from the Phase III ACHEVE-1 study in diabetes touting the drug’s 1.5% reduction in blood glucose levels (A1C) at 40 weeks. In August, the pharma followed up with weight-loss data from the late-stage ATTAIN-2, showing a 10.5% drop in body weight at 72 weeks.
Lilly plans to file for orforglipron’s approval, with a submission expected within the year.
With orforglipron, Lilly is close on the heels of Novo Nordisk, which is proposing an oral formulation of its weight-loss behemoth Wegovy. The pharma has already filed an application, which the FDA accepted in May and expects to decide on before the end of the year.
Many other biotechs are also rushing to develop their own weight-loss pills, including Viking Therapeutics, which is testing its GLP-1/GIP agonist VK2735 in the Phase II VENTURE-Oral trial, with enrollment completing in March. The company is also advancing a subcutaneous formulation of VK2735.
Also in the game is Roche, which in December 2023 bet $2.7 billion to acquire Carmot Therapeutics and its pipeline of obesity treatments, including the once-daily pill CT-996. The drug has just started Phase II development.
