Eli Lilly to build $6.5 billion Texas manufacturing facility for obesity pill, other drugs

Eli Lilly connected Tuesday said it volition walk $6.5 cardinal to physique a manufacturing installation successful Houston, Texas, to boost accumulation of the company's pipeline of alleged tiny molecule drugs, including its intimately watched experimental obesity pill. 

It is the 2nd successful a drawstring of caller planned U.S. investments by the drugmaker. Eli Lilly announced successful February that it would spend astatine slightest $27 billion to physique 4 caller home manufacturing plants, adding to $23 cardinal successful erstwhile investments since 2020. 

Eli Lilly said it volition denote the 2 remaining U.S. sites this year. The institution expects to statesman making medicines astatine each 4 facilities wrong 5 years. 

That added accumulation capableness for Eli Lilly's obesity pill, orforglipron, is important arsenic the institution races to bring it to marketplace and tries to support its dominance successful the booming marketplace for GLP-1s. Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk person antecedently faced proviso constraints with their existing play injections, arsenic request skyrocketed successful the U.S. 

"Our caller Houston tract volition heighten Lilly's quality to manufacture orforglipron astatine standard and, if approved, assistance fulfill the medicine's imaginable arsenic an obesity and benignant 2 diabetes attraction for tens of millions of radical worldwide who similar the easiness of a pill that tin beryllium taken without nutrient and h2o restrictions," Eli Lilly CEO David Ricks said successful the release. 

Drugmakers person been scrambling to boost their accumulation successful the U.S. arsenic President Donald Trump threatens to enforce tariffs connected pharmaceuticals imported into the U.S. Trump has said those levies volition promote companies to re-shore accumulation aft home cause manufacturing shrank dramatically implicit the past decade.

In a merchandise Tuesday, Eli Lilly said the caller Houston works volition absorption connected manufacturing orforglipron and the company's pipeline of different tiny molecule medicines crossed antithetic illness areas, including cardiometabolic health, oncology, immunology and neuroscience. Small molecule drugs, which often travel successful pill form, are much convenient for patients to instrumentality than injectable medications and are mostly easier and cheaper to manufacture astatine scale.  

Eli Lilly said the tract volition bring 615 jobs to the Greater Houston area, including highly skilled engineers, scientists, operations unit and laboratory technicians, and 4,000 operation jobs.