TRANSACTION TITANS.

• Author: Ellis, Kevin

The North Carolina Economic Development Association honored A its top achievers at its annual conference last month in Wilmington. The award winners, representing both big cities and small towns, helped arrange significant deals that brought jobs and investments to their communities.

BURTON HODGES executive director Transylvania Economic Alliance

DEAL OF THE YEAR SMALL MARKET

PISGAH LABS

Pisgah Labs' 2022 expansion in Transylvania County was not just an economic win, but helps establish an area best known for tourism and retirement living as a player in biopharmaceuticals. Pisgah Labs started in 1981 and now holds 31 patents. The company manufactures active ingredients in medicines and the $55 million expansion added 57 jobs to the site, tripling its workforce, and allowing it to manufacture intravenous medicines.

Transylvania County Manager Jaime Laughter describes the project as the largest single economic development project in recent history. The new jobs will have an annual salary of about $60,000, compared with the county's current average wage of about $39,000.

Hodges helped Pisgah Labs recognize the county of about 33,000 residents has an available workforce with the skills and education programs that align with biotechnology. Hodges started working in Transylvania County in February 2022 after about six years with Henderson County's economic development group. He has a political science and communications degree from Brevard College.

DEAL OF THE YEAR MIDSIZE MARKET

STERITEK

California-based SteriTek wanted to start its first East Coast site on a property that had enough surrounding land for additional life sciences employers. The medical and pharmaceutical sterilization company purchased 85 acres as part of a $71 million investment that will create 50 jobs in Burlington.

SteriTek plans to use about 13 acres, leaving room for four more building sites, serving as a long-term opportunity for life sciences investments in Burlington. Bishop was especially helpful in assisting SteriTek to find its own property, as well as land for future development.

The SteriTek project will help Alamance County brand itself as a life-sciences hub. This project took advantage of Alamance Community Colleges decision to start a biotechnology center. The move builds on the momentum of the burgeoning biotech, pharmaceutical, and medical technology industries in the region bordering Research Triangle Park in Durham and Wake counties. Burlington is also the headquarters of testing giant Labcorp.

Bishop and Putnam worked for almost a year in recruiting SteriTek to Alamance County, guiding the project through the local incentives process. "Their work was crucial to massage the bumps in the road and get the project across the line," wrote Alamance Chamber President Reagan Gural and Blake Moyer, formerly with the city of Burlington's economic development agency, in nominating the duo. Moyer is now president of the Surry County Economic Development Partnership.

The new positions are...