Nephron could add hundreds of jobs to Lexington County with new building purchase

Bristow Marchant
·2 min read

A major Lexington County employer will be adding jobs at a new site in a county industrial park.

Lexington County Council on Tuesday approved the sale of a county-owned spec building in the Saxe Gotha Industrial Park to locally-based Nephron Pharmaceuticals, expanding the footprint of what is already a big Midlands company.

Under the terms approved by the council, Nephron will pay $4.8 million for the already built speculative building, meant to lure a manufacturer to the industrial site between Interstate 26 and 12th Street Extension south of Cayce. Nephron already has facilities in the park, which also includes the Amazon fulfillment center.

Sarah Johnson, the county’s economic development director, told council members the sale is part of a new $100 million investment in Lexington County from Nephron, which the company projects will add another 250 jobs to the county.

“Our economic policy is based on adding jobs, particularly manufacturing jobs, to the county, and that’s what this is,” said County Council Chairman Todd Cullum.

The latest announcement comes on top of a planned $215 million expansion Nephron announced last year. That plan will add 380 jobs over four years to the company’s Saxe Gotha operations, including building new office, warehouse and vaccine production space. The company has already created 1,800 jobs at the site over the previous five years, Nephron said at the time.

It’s unclear what Nephron will do with the spec building. The State called Nephron CEO Lou Kennedy, who was unable to talk Wednesday but said she was visiting a lab in the Netherlands on a trip related to the expansion project.

Nephron develops and produces generic inhalation solutions and suspension products, including those used to treat severe respiratory distress symptoms associated with COVID-19. The company also operates a 503B Outsourcing Facility division which produces pre-filled sterile syringes and IV bags for hospitals across the United States.