Mayne Expansion Fueled by Shared Vision
The Daily Reflector by Michael Abramowitz GREENVILLE, NC (September 24, 2015) - A shared business vision was the foundation for a deal that led to Wednesday’s groundbreaking on a $65 million pharmaceutical facility expansion that will add more than 100 jobs in Pitt County, company executives told N.C. Gov. Pat McCrory on Wednesday in Greenville. Roger Corbett, board chairman of the Australia-based Mayne Pharma Group, Chief Executive Officer Scott Richards and Stefan Cross, president of Mayne Pharma USA, joined McCrory and N.C. Commerce Secretary John Skvarla for a celebration on the front lawn of the Indigreen Corporate Park facility on Sugg Parkway. “We Aussies know the value of a quid (dollar), and this is the right place indeed for the investment of our quid,” Corbett told McCrory. Mayne Pharma in 2012 paid $120 million for Metrics Inc., a grassroots contract drug analytical laboratory founded in 1994 by East Carolina University graduate Phil Hodges and ECU professor John Bray. Mayne Pharma was founded in 1845 in Australia as F.H. Faulding for the delivery of oral dosage forms of drugs. Today, Mayne Pharma and its Metrics Contract Services staff solve drug delivery problems for their pharmaceutical company customers across the United States. “The talent, education and ability of our team right here has brought us a lot of pharma business nationwide,” Corbett said. “That is an immense tribute to the work ethic found in this state.” McCrory praised Hodges and investors Collice Moore, Harvey Lewis and Parker Overton, who backed Hodges’ efforts to start Metrics, for their sense of community and entrepreneurial spirit. “This is the best of North Carolina and also the best of our relationships with other countries,” McCrory said of the Metrics-Mayne connection. “People like Phil and his investment team make our country great. If Phil did not have the vision and his investors the courage to put their hard-earned capital down on this, today would not have happened.” The $65-million strategic investment will fund a new greenfield 126,000-square-foot, oral-dose commercial manufacturing facility adjacent to the company’s Sugg Parkway building. While creating 110 new jobs locally and the capacity for hundreds more later, the expansion will more than double Mayne Pharma’s U.S. manufacturing capacity to support and accelerate organic growth. The facility will be realigned to significantly expand the contract analytical laboratory and formulation development services capacity. A new visitor and staff administrative center will be built, linking the two main buildings. The expansion means Mayne Pharma can introduce commercial-scale manufacturing capability for its modified drug delivery products, an offering the company provides at its Australia facility. The company has seven modified-release products in the pipeline targeting markets with sales greater than $3.5 billion; three have been filed with the FDA. All U.S. distribution will be consolidated to Mayne Pharma’s Greenville campus, company officials said. Skvarla congratulated the Mayne Pharma executives for their choice of Pitt County as USA headquarters for their pharmaceutical manufacturing enterprise. “You selected a location with an engaged university, a robust community college system, a teaching hospital, access to agriculture and aquaculture resources, proximity to military bases and an outstanding workforce,” he said. Skvarla also praised the Pitt County Development Commission and the Committee of 100 for their ongoing efforts to attract and retain the area’s industry. “No one is more passionate about your development than the people who live here,” he said. Hodges retired from Metrics following its sale and now occupies a seat on the Mayne Pharma board. The expansion is made possible in part by a performance-based grant of $550,000 from the One North Carolina Fund, which provides financial assistance, through local governments, to attract business projects that will stimulate economic activity and create new jobs within the state. Company officials anticipate that the new commercial facility should be fully operational in 2018.
