Novo Nordisk adds land at Clayton site amid expansion report, Wegovy and Ozempic surge
In 2015, the Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk announced plans to double its facility space in Johnston County with a $1.85 billion investment, then the largest manufacturing commitment in state history. Signs suggest another major expansion could be coming.
In an interview last week with Yahoo Finance, Novo Nordisk chief financial officer Karsten Munk Knudsen said her team seeks to “expand our industrial footprint” to meet surging demand for the drugmaker’s two wildly popular weight loss shots, Ozempic and Wegovy.
Local deeds indicate Johnston is a candidate. Throughout last year, the health care giant purchased land near its two existing facilities on Powhatan Road, southeast of downtown Clayton. In its biggest 2023 acquisition, Novo Nordisk spent $6.8 million in February for a little over 100 acres, local deeds records show.
Three months later, the company asked Johnston County to rezone this former farmland from agricultural to industrial use, citing a need for employee parking space as it constructed and expanded the site. The county approved the request.
“That rezoning application was in anticipation of early site evaluations to determine suitability for potential construction,” company spokesperson Nicole Ferreira said this week.
Last year, Novo Nordisk also paid $4.5 million for 59 more acres and made a handful of smaller land acquisitions — all along Powhatan Road.
On Monday, Novo Nordisk’s parent company acquired Catalent, a New Jersey-based contract drug manufacturer that produces Wegovy, in a move seen to beef up supply capacity. The same day, the Triangle Business Journal cited three unnamed sources in Johnston County who said Novo Nordisk could soon unveil a multibillion-dollar investment in the North Carolina county.
This report followed months of speculation about the company’s intentions in Johnston. In September 2022, county commissioners approved a 12-year economic incentive to entice Novo Nordisk to expand locally. At the meeting, Johnston County Economic Development director Chris Johnson stated it was “Novo Nordisk’s desire to invest within their existing campus on Powhatan Road in Clayton.”
Novo Nordisk shared it is exploring sites, though it wouldn’t confirm leading candidates.
“While we do not have specific Clayton announcement plans at this time, we are proud of our 30-year legacy in North Carolina,” Ferreira said. “With the intensifying demand for Novo Nordisk’s life-saving and essential medications, we are in the process of site evaluations which include more intense groundwork than customary.”
Making space for Wegovy?
Novo Nordisk opened its first Clayton facility in 1993. About 20 miles southeast of Raleigh, the site assembles injectable finished products (IFPs) like insulin pens. In 2018, the company committed an additional $65 million to this original plant.
Then in 2020, the company completed its new $1.85 billion Clayton factory, the first Novo Nordisk facility outside of Denmark to manufacture active drugs. North Carolina and Johnston County together awarded around $70 million in incentives to support the project over 12 years.
Today, Novo Nordisk is one of Johnston’s top employers, with roughly 2,200 workers across the two facilities. Boosted by its surging weight-loss drugs, the company recently surpassed a market capitalization of $400 billion.
The company wouldn’t confirm whether its Clayton facility already manufactures the weight-loss medications, which have garnered more than 9 million prescriptions since they hit the market. The Federal Drug Administration approved Ozempic to treat type 2 diabetes in 2017 and greenlit Wegovy for weight management in 2021.
But these medications, and their costs, have strained relations between North Carolina and Novo Nordisk. In October, the N.C. State Health Plan’s board of trustees imposed a moratorium on new Wegovy prescriptions, citing untenable prices. The moratorium began Jan. 1. Then on Jan. 25, the board voted to end all plan coverage for Wegovy and other weight-loss drugs beginning April 1.
Their growing demand and hefty price tags made coverage too costly, NCSHP staff said. North Carolina’s was the first state health plan to take such action.
Ferreira told the N&O that Novo Nordisk “strongly opposes creating new hurdles for patient access to care.” She added her company will continue “to engage with NCSHP officials to address any potential cost concerns.”
