January 21, 2016
By Alex Keown, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
ORLANDO – Florida-based Nephron Pharmaceuticals is slashing another 250 jobs at its Orlando manufacturing facility, the Orlando Business Journal reported Thursday afternoon.
The maker of generic respiratory medications filed a WARN notice with the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity saying that 250 workers will be laid off between March 18 and April 1. This week’s layoffs comes only three months after the company announced it was terminating 400 employees, before reducing that number to 180. The layoffs were part of the company’s strategy to transfer much of the work it does to a new $313 million facility in Columbia, S.C.
The company chose to shift the operations to South Carolina due to tax incentives offered by government officials. South Carolina’s tax package had the potential of $352.3 million in savings, mostly from tax exemptions from property taxes for 30 years. BioSpace previously reported another tax may have played a factor in the move – the way the states tax the actual equipment in the facility, rather than just the building and company. In Florida, the equipment inside the facility is taxed the same way the real estate is. South Carolina, as well as other states, including Texas, cap the amount of equipment and personal property that can be taxed, or often exemptions.
Nephron initially said it planned on hiring approximately 700 employees for the South Carolina facility, but that has not come to pass, according to reports. On its website, the company includes a portal to apply for positions at its South Carolina location. The company has open positions for analytical chemists, validation managers and specialists, quality assurance supervisors and more.
In October, Lou Kennedy, Nephron’s chief executive officer, said the company planned to keep a “core staff” in Orlando and “continue to run respiratory products and look for any other special products suited to the facility here.” However, the Orlando Business Journal noted the elimination of 180 employees in October and the termination of 250 beginning in March will “nearly wipe out the entire Orlando workforce” for Nephron.
In December, Nephron had to recall 80,000 cartons of an over-the-counter asthma product, Asthmanefrin Racepinephrine Inhalation Solution Bronchodilator refills, due to “discoloration issues,” FiercePharma reported. This is not the first time the company has had to recall its products. In 2013, Nephron initiated a class 1 recall of the EZ Breathe Atomizer because of a manufacturing defect. According to reports, the recall happened due to a manufacturing defect that could result in a quarter-inch-diameter washer breaking off the atomizer and becoming lodged in the throat of someone using the drug.
Nephron focuses on manufacturing generic respiratory drugs and contract manufacturing. It is also the only manufacturer of Racemic Epinephrine.
