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Posted Apr 20, 2010, 1:49 PM
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Diplomat Specialty Pharmacy plans to add 1,000 jobs in 5 years
http://www.mlive.com/news/flint/inde...wth_autho.html
Quote:
Diplomat Specialty Pharmacy plans to add 1,000 jobs in 5 years; Michigan Economic Growth Authority (MEGA) board expected to approve $61.5 million tax break today for Flint expansion
By Melissa Burden | Flint Journal
April 20, 2010, 12:00AM
FLINT, Michigan — Some big changes could be coming for a Flint Township pharmacy that got its start as a “mom-and-pop shop.”
The Michigan Economic Growth Authority (MEGA) board is expected today to approve a $61.5 million tax credit for Diplomat Specialty Pharmacy that that will allow the company to hire more than 1,000 people over the next five years and move its headquarters into part of the Great Lakes Technology Centre on Saginaw Street in Flint.
Diplomat plans to invest $12 million over the next five years into what will become its national distribution center, said Phil Hagerman, president and chief executive officer of the company that he and his father Dale Hagerman founded more than 35 years ago.
“We’re in the business of job creation, so this is a significant job creator over the next five years,” said Tim Herman, president and CEO of the Genesee Regional Chamber of Commerce.
The chamber, city of Flint, Career Alliance and the state worked with Diplomat to secure an incentive package that beat out locations the company was considering in Ohio and Texas, Herman said.
If approved at a Lansing meeting today, tax breaks from MEGA over 18 years will help the specialty pharmacy company create more than 4,000 total new jobs.
“This economic development project is bigger than a new auto plant,” Flint Mayor Dayne Walling said. “There will be significant benefit to the surrounding neighborhood.”
Diplomat, which last year was named one of fastest growing companies in America by Inc. magazine and expects to generate $600 million in revenue this year, is close to buying Building B — a 340,000 square-foot space — at the former General Motors facility, Hagerman said.
He said 275 workers will move into the building this year.
The company, which Hagerman described as “one of Michigan’s best kept secrets,” has more than 400 employees with about 300 based in Genesee County and plans to add 140 employees this year.
“It’s really an exciting time for Diplomat,” Hagerman said.
Hagerman said Diplomat had been considering opening a West Coast hub for the growth it is experiencing there, but decided to “go against the tide” and focus job growth in Genesee County, where it all began.
The privately held specialty pharmacy serves patients across the country, filling prescriptions for people with cancer, multiple sclerosis or Rheumatoid Arthritis that average $1,000 to $5,000 each.
The company, which is heavily patient focused because of the expensive and special prescriptions, plans to add jobs in areas such as information technology specialists, patient care coordinators, pharmacists, nurses, call center specialists and pharmacy technicians.
Career Alliance also plans to provide $14 million in training over the next 10 years to current and new Diplomat employees, paid for with federal and state dollars, said Alicia Booker, president and CEO of Career Alliance.
Herman and Walling said the new jobs coming to the city and county are in the life sciences sector, which is a area targeted for job growth in the city and county’s recently adopted Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy.
“It further diversifies our economy,” Herman said.
Flint City Council also will be taking up a brownfield tax credit and Renaissance Zone designation to keep Diplomat here, Walling said.
"This is great news for the City Of Flint," said Delrico Loyd, president of the Flint City Council in a statement. "All aspects of the healthcare industry are growing. I am hoping with the expansion of Diplomat Specialty Pharmacy into our city it serves as a springboard to attract similar business to our area with the same kind of job creation and economic development potential."
Herman, who sits on the MEGA board, said the MEGA board sees an importance of keeping these jobs in Michigan as it considers granting Diplomat’s tax breaks over 18 years. He said Diplomat’s job creation also is expected to create about 3,100 spin-off jobs.
“They needed to anchor a new industry in Michigan,” Hagerman said.
Diplomat is the only national specialty pharmacy headquartered in Michigan. Other states with specialty pharmacy companies have seen thousands of jobs created in the growing industry in the past five to seven years, Hagerman said.
“We believe the state has given us the opportunity now to recreate that model in Michigan,” he said.
Spin-off jobs could come from other bio-technology companies locating in Diplomat’s space or in other areas of the massive technology centre or the surrounding areas, Hagerman said.
“Our goal would be to create a bio-technology corridor,” he said.
Diplomat’s flagship retail pharmacy — which fills 750 to 1,000 prescriptions a day — will remain on Beecher Road in Flint Township, Hagerman said.
But 95 percent of the company’s dollar volume of business comes from outside the traditional pharmacy storefront.
The company has distribution centers in Swartz Creek and Cleveland and has offices in Grand Rapids, Chicago, California and Florida.
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