An $895 million expansion at Merck Animal Health in De Soto promises to create 200 new jobs and be the second largest private investment in Kansas history besides Panasonic.
Merck Animal Health and Gov. Laura Kelly announced the news Thursday in a news release.
De Soto City Administrator Mike Brungardt said this project will be beneficial to the community and validates the city’s long relationship built and maintained with Merck throughout the last couple of decades.
For Merck to want to double the investment in the De Soto community shows the benefits with the community and business environment, he said.
“So what that means for us and for citizens with economic opportunities like this, we firmly believe and we’ve seen throughout time that those types of things translate directly to quality of life benefits for our residents and for residents of the region, Eudora included,” Brungardt said.
Over the next five years, it will bring 2,500 construction jobs, he said.
The new facility will also bring revenues for other amenities and programs that would have otherwise not been available, he said.
“Next step for them, you know they intend to proceed with construction of the project soon,” he said. “We will be engaging with them on building permits, things of that nature, but also just the nature of the planning – site plans and zoning approvals and other approvals they’ll need to implement the project.”
With a project this scale, it will take a number of years, but it’s expected the production portion will be operational in 2030, he said.
The new site will be just west of where the current site is next to K-10, so the project will be visible from the highway, he said.
The diversification of the tax base while having an industrial user like this helps add value to the community and lower tax burdens on residents and other businesses in town, Brungardt said.
The plant is investing $860 million in the existing facility and spending another $35 million for its research and development lab, showing the company’s investments in innovative health solutions that advance prevention and treatment of diseases in both animals and people.
The expanded facility will be 200,000 square feet and allow Merck to expand filling and freeze dryer capacity for large molecule vaccines and biologic products.
It will play a role in manufacturing animal health products and complement the international network of animal health product plants, the press release said. The investment in research and development labs will allow for research and a focus on advancing drug discovery.
Merck Animal Health President Richard DeLuca said in a statement that the De Soto site is strategically located in the heart of an animal health corridor.
“This region is renowned for its concentration of animal health companies, fostering an unparalleled ecosystem for innovation, collaboration and industry leadership,” he said in a statement. “This investment in our site is designed to increase Merck Animal Health’s ability to meet the growing customer demand for its portfolio of animal biologics products and ensure the company remains at the forefront of innovation in the animal health sector.”
Gov. Laura Kelly said in a statement that public-private partnerships that lead to major global projects, such as those with Merck, Fiserv and Panasonic, are occurring because people believe in Kansas.
“They believe in who we are, what we are doing and the direction we have taken,” she said in a statement.
