Global healthcare firm to bring 500 new jobs to Middletown

Biotech and manufacturing continue to grow in Delaware.

WuXi STA, a glocal subsidiary of Shanghai-based WuXi AppTec, has chosen Middletown as the location for its new manufacturing campus, bringing 500 jobs to southern New Castle County by 2026, with another 1,000 or more planned with future expansion.

WuXi STA, a Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization (CDMO), will build the new campus in Middletown Business Center with plans for a 2024 opening. It will be the company’s first location on the East Coast.

As a CDMO, the company offers manufacturing services for both drug substance and drug product. The future Middletown facility will include testing laboratories, as well as manufacturing and packaging of pharmaceutical products. Jobs will include manufacturing operators, lab technicians, quality assurance and quality control staff, as well as scientists and management, along with administrative and warehouse support staff.

“WuXi STA is excited to join Delaware’s growing healthcare community and establish Middletown as the home of our new state-of-the-art pharmaceutical clinical and commercial manufacturing complex,” said Minzhang Chen, CEO of WuXi STA. “Delaware’s highly trained pharmaceutical manufacturing workforce and proximity to many of our customers provide tremendous opportunities to support the region’s economic growth and efforts to advance pharmaceutical development and manufacturing. We are grateful to Delaware and Middletown for their leadership in fostering a strong entrepreneurial and innovation ecosystem, and we look forward to collaborating to deliver groundbreaking treatments for patients.”

WuXi STA, which worked with the Delaware Prosperity Partnership as it looked at Delaware as a potential home for the facility, received grants from the Delaware Strategic Fund from the state Council on Finance Development to support its plan.

“We win the future by attracting global leading healthcare firms like WuXi STA to New Castle County,” said New Castle County Executive Matt Meyer. “This project will bring hundreds of good-paying jobs to the area and will advance New Castle County’s goal of growing our biotech industry. We welcome WuXi STA to New Castle County and look forward to its partnerships in Middletown and all across our community as it looks to fill jobs from our local and talented workforce.”

The new WuXi STA facility will be near other recent Middletown developments, including a one million square-foot Amazon fulfillment center, Datwyler Sealing Solutions’ manufacturing plant and Breakthru Beverage’s new headquarters.