Eli Lilly has revealed the foremost plans from its new swathe of new drug manufacturing facilities it aims to build across the US, with Goochland County, Virginia, confirmed as the location for the first plant.
Goochland County is located in central Virginia, bordering the state’s capital city of Richmond on its northwestern side.
The $5bn manufacturing facility will be Eli Lilly’s first “dedicated, fully integrated” active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) and drug product facility for the big pharma company’s bioconjugate platform and monoclonal antibody (mAb) portfolio.
The site will also boost Lilly’s domestic manufacturing of antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), a modality with growing use in cancer treatment. Lilly does not have a US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved ADC but has multiple assets in clinical trials.
Lilly expects the building to be completed within the next five years. The total facility will employ 650 people.
The site announcement is part of the company’s wider strategy to bolster domestic production of pharmaceutical products amid pressure on the industry from US President Donald Trump’s administration. In February 2025, Lilly outlaid $27bn for the creation of four new drug manufacturing facilities, bringing the total US capital expansion commitments to more than $50bn since 2020.
The 650 jobs created in Goochland County are part of an anticipated 3,000 jobs that will be established across the four sites, including positions for engineers, scientists, and operations personnel.
The company plans to announce the three remaining US manufacturing sites this year and expects to begin making medicines at these four facilities within five years.
“By expanding manufacturing capacity here in the United States, we are strengthening our economy, securing America's critical pharmaceutical supply chain, and positioning Virginia to lead in the industries that will drive innovation for generations to come,” said Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin.
Lilly said it chose Virginia’s Goochland County out of hundreds of applications for other locations, adding that it based its decision on workforce availability, local incentives, and transportation links, among others.
The company expects that for every dollar invested in the Virginia facility, up to four dollars will be generated in local economic activity.
President Trump previously mentioned that Eli Lilly would not be tariffed earlier this year due to the company’s $50bn investment in manufacturing plants in the US.
Lilly is not the only company to target Virginia as a location for US manufacturing expansion. UK big pharma company AstraZeneca plans to build a “multi-billion dollar” drug substance facility in the state, part of a wider $50bn commitment to bolster its footprint in the US.
Elsewhere in the pharma industry, Johnson & Johnson is set to invest $55bn over the next four years, including a $2bn biologics production site in North Carolina that promises to create 500 jobs. Roche outlaid a similar amount, planning $50bn worth of investment in the US, which will generate more than 1,000 jobs in new and expanded facilities.
On the same day Lilly announced its Virginia site plans, GSK pledged $30bn to US research and development.
Despite the hefty investments, analysis by GlobalData has identified that a wave of scepticism has emerged within the industry regarding the effectiveness of Trump’s onshoring push. Indeed, a new scheme established by the FDA to streamline the introduction of new drug manufacturing sites in the country was met with mixed reception when announced in August 2025
