How does a Fortune 100 company decide which community is the ideal location to build a multi-billion-dollar manufacturing hub? And how do a community and state position themselves to compete for such a rare investment? 
Those insights were revealed during Lehigh Valley Economic Development Corporation’s recent Annual Meeting, with a panel discussion that explored how Eli Lilly and Company chose the Lehigh Valley for a $3.5 billion campus, which more than 300 other regions were competing for.
The panel shared how Pennsylvania officials and Lehigh Valley partners led by LVEDC collaborated to meet Lilly’s infrastructure, utility, and workforce needs to ensure the project can be completed on time.
The panelists were:
- Jay Biggins, Executive Managing Director, Biggins Lacy Shapiro & Co.
- Don Cunningham, President & CEO, LVEDC
- Ben Kirshner, Pennsylvania Chief Transformation & Opportunity Officer
- Daniel VonDielingen, Senior Vice President-Global Parenteral Network Expansion, Eli Lilly and Company
Selecting a site for an investment such as Lilly’s involves analyzing hundreds of variables including cost, speed-to-market, and the ability for a community to supply a trained workforce, said Jay Biggins, Executive Managing Director of Biggins Lacy Shapiro & Co., the site selection consultant retained by Lilly to conduct the search.
He said the search involves eliminating sites until only one remains. While the process is data heavy, it also involves developing a level of trust that a state and community can deliver what they promise and keep the project on schedule.
“There’s an immense amount of trust in the people involved,” Biggins told the record audience of about 1,000 people who attended LVEDC’s Annual Meeting at ArtsQuest Center at SteelStacks in Bethlehem on March 17.
He said Lehigh Valley and Pennsylvania established credibility because leading state officials, including Gov. Josh Shapiro, Secretary of Community and Economic Development Rick Siger, and Chief Transformation & Opportunity Officer Ben Kirshner were part of the process.
Biggins said the cooperation and coordination by LVEDC, led by President & CEO Don Cunningham, and all the local partners ranging from utility providers to local government to the construction trades, was critical.
“There are so many parties that have come together and get everything right to make these projects work,” he said.
Partners included property owner Jaindl Land Development; Lehigh Carbon Community College, which is developing a training program for life sciences workers including Lilly; Upper Macungie Township, where Lilly plans to build; PPL Electric Utilities; Lehigh County Authority; UGI Utilities; Parkland School District; Lehigh County; The Pidcock Company; Biggins Lacy Shapiro & Co.; and CBRE.
Kirshner said Gov. Shapiro positioned Pennsylvania to compete for significant investments such as Lilly by developing business-friendly strategies, including the nation’s first Fast Track Program that expedites approvals for significant projects to get them to market sooner.
“It's really working,” he said.
He said the state has improved accountability and transparency by approving permits and business licenses faster. It started a money back guarantee program that refunds application fees when permits, licenses, and certificates are not delivered by deadline. That has happened only five times out of more than 40 million approvals issued across 22 agencies.
“The agencies are doing a tremendous job meeting those goals for business,” Kirshner said.
Cunningham said Lehigh Valley could not have competed for Lilly without the state support and new strategies.
“You need a state government that's going to have the strategy, the people, and the money to get it done,” he said, singling out the work done by Kirshner’s office to accelerate the government’s ability to deliver what business needs.
“You call one person that can bust through 15 different agencies,” he said.
Cunningham said the vision of local leaders was essential, with property owner David Jaindl and his company working with Upper Macungie Township to have the property where Lilly will build zoned for pharmaceutical manufacturing. A new interchange was also planned for Interstate 78 near the property, providing direct access.
Kirshner said the coalition of Lehigh Valley partners worked seamlessly over 18 months.
“Everyone was rowing in the same direction, and it was just magical watching it happen and you guys deserve a lot of credit,” he said.
VonDielingen said workforce was key in Lilly’s decision. He said Lilly concluded that the Lehigh Valley could provide the talent needed to perform the many roles necessary to make medicine.
“You need to have a workforce that enables manufacturing automation, technology, robotics,” he said. “And we believe that we found that here. You’ve got a long history of manufacturing.”
Community colleges play a vital role, he said, as they can provide as much as half of the talent that’s necessary.
Lehigh Carbon Community College will play a key role in helping Lilly to build a talent pipeline by creating and expanding academic and workforce training programs in life sciences.
Cunningham said LVEDC’s Talent Strategies Initiative, led by Vice President of Talent Strategies Karianne Gelinas and supported by LVEDC’s Board of Directors, provided critical data to show the region has the workforce to support Lilly’s operations.
He said LVEDC was able to show Lilly that Lehigh Valley has access to a labor force of about 1.8 million within an hour’s drive, and that about 215,000 people within an hour's drive of the Lilly site currently work in occupations that Lilly projects it will be hiring for.
“Having a system where we could showcase that we had a talent pathway was important,” Cunningham said.
He stressed that it was Lilly’s commitment to expanding manufacturing in the U.S. that drove the entire process. 
“If Eli Lilly and Company doesn't say we're going to make things in the United States, we're not even having this conversation.”
VonDielingen told the Annual Meeting audience that Lilly is committed to working with Lehigh Valley companies and working toward the region’s common goals, including workforce development.
“I can't emphasize enough that we want to be a partner in that ecosystem with the companies that are all represented here in the room to work together,” he said. “We're making medicine. You all might be making something else, but we all face common challenges and problems. We're all the same. So, we need to make sure that we're working together through all that, and ultimately, to grow the workforce.”
The panel discussion was moderated by Grover Silcox, a long-time television personality and five-time Emmy Award winner.
Annual Meeting Sponsors
Capital Blue Cross was the Presenting Sponsor of LVEDC’s Annual Meeting. Cocktail Sponsors were BSI Corporate Benefits and Fitzpatrick Lentz & Bubba. Gold Sponsors were Alvernia University; B. Braun; Community Bank; Crayola; Fulton Bank; PenTeleData; Steamfitters Union 420; and WFMZ. Silver Sponsors were Evans Wealth Strategies; Hatzel and Buehler; HNL Lab Medicine; Lehigh Valley Health Network, part of Jefferson Health; Peoples & Co.; St. Luke's University Health Network; Suites at 462 Main by Hotel Bethlehem; Whiting-Turner Company; and Wind Creek Bethlehem. Community Sponsors were ADVANCE at Cedar Crest; Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Northeastern Pennsylvania; CLA; Ethosource Office Furniture; H.T. Lyons, Inc.; Lesavoy Butz & Seitz, LLC; Moravian University-University Partnerships; OraSure Technologies, Inc.; PPL Electric Utilities; RESPEC; and ServPro Team Davis.
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(Photos by Marco Calderon Photography)