By Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
Get our mobile app
ROCKFORD — PCI Pharma Services is building a new $150 million facility in Rockford that will increase its capacity to make injectable drug-delivery devices that can be used in oncology treatment, as well as for diabetes, weight loss and autoimmune diseases.
The company gathered with its board members and investors on Thursday to celebrate the start of Cord Construction’s work to build a 200,000-square-foot Rockford Biologics Center at 4840 Linden Road. The center, which was designed by Blakemore Architects, can be expanded to 300,000 square feet to meet customer demand.
“We really could have put this building anywhere in the world; we wanted to be in Rockford,” said Mike Ellingson, general manager for PCI Rockford, which is the largest of the company’s 30 locations across the world. “This is our flagship. Our people are here. This is where we felt like we could get real synergies.”
More news: Ripe Life Juice Co. to move into former Rockford Roasting Co. in downtown Rockford
The production center is flanked by a 200,000-square-foot cold-storage warehouse that Cord Construction started work on this spring.
PCI, which is one of the city’s largest employers with roughly 2,500 workers, has more than doubled its employment ranks in the past five years.
It plans to hire an additional 250 people at the new site. The company, which is centered at 4545 Assembly Drive, has been fast growing as global access to medicine increased, said Justin Schroeder, global vice president of technical sales.
“We service medicines that are destined to over 100 countries around the world,” Schroeder said. “A lot of what we do here in Rockford actually goes to very far-flung places like Japan, like China, etc.”
Roughly four years ago, total staffing in Rockford was about 1,200 people, Ellingson said.
“After COVID hit we quickly surged up based on the demand of COVID products, as well as some standard comfort buys — Tylenol, Benadryl, Crest white strips — things that we’ve packaged historically here, and we’ve seen a surge in that business that’s sustained even through COVID.”
The latest growth represents an evolution in pharmaceuticals for more auto-injectable drug delivery devices, which patients can pick up from a pharmacy and administer themselves.
“It’s just a complete sea change in the pharmaceutical business,” said Brad Payne, chief operating officer for PCI. “I believe it will be common in the next 10 years that people auto-inject themselves at home.”
More news: Real estate investment trust acquires land under Hard Rock Casino Rockford, enters 99-year lease
The facility will have high-tech multiformat machines designed for assembling and packaging vials, prefilled syringes, auto-injectors and pen-cartridge combinations. It will also have extensive product-testing capability and cartoning technology.
“It is a much more technologically advanced piece of equipment,” Ellingson said. “Our maintenance people, our mechanics, the people who do the work on that equipment, will be much more trained on the robotics side of the business.”
The project was initially announced as costing $50 million in March, but that number grew as the company added more customers and expanded the rooms and equipment needed.
“Since that time, every room that we decide to build for future growth is an additional $50-$60 million in equipment,” Ellingson said. “So as we stand here today we have a couple of large customers at different phases in this process and we’ve begun to buy equipment for them, and that’s where that pricetag has gone from $50 (million) to $150 million.
“We’ll finish up the building here and we’ll be in that $150-$200 million range before we’re done.”
More news: New restaurant Jalisco & Tequila is open in downtown Rockford
The company did extensive research on the Rockford area’s workforce to determine if it would be able to continue to grow here, Ellingson said.
“The results of it were really, really good. They showed us that there are more employees out there for us,” he said. “As soon as we found that out we knew we wanted to stay here in the Rockford community. I’m local to the area, and it’s just really important where possible that we can support our community here.”
Payne said employees have been able to grow with the company, including three site leaders here who were interns 15 years ago.
“This city embodies the Midwestern mentality — the culture, the work ethic,” Payne said. “The people that we’re able to hire here, they won’t leave. Not that we want them to leave, but they stay because Rockford’s an amazing place, and this whole area is an amazing place.”
The facility is expected to open in about a year.
This article is by Kevin Haas. Email him at khaas@rockrivercurrent.com or follow him on X at @KevinMHaas or Instagram @thekevinhaas and Threads @thekevinhaas