INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- Drugmaker Eli Lilly and Co. is planning to spend about $260 million to expand insulin production and make some other capital improvements to sites in its home city.
The Indianapolis company said Tuesday it aims to spend about $180 million on some new construction, the addition of another insulin cartridge-filling line to an expansion it announced last fall and the installation of some new equipment.
The drugmaker also plans to spend about $80 million on some other projects, including a product inspection center. A company spokesman said the city's metropolitan development commission must approve tax abatements before construction can start.
Last fall, Lilly said it would expand its manufacturing operations in Indianapolis to make cartridges that deliver insulin to patients to help meet growing U.S. demand for diabetes treatments. The company's announcement Tuesday is in addition to that expansion.
Diabetes is a chronic disease in which the body does not properly produce or use the hormone insulin, and treatments for it have long been a key element of Lilly's product portfolio.
The insulin Humalog was the company's third-best selling drug last year, bringing in about $2.4 billion in total revenue. Lilly also started teaming up in 2011 with German drug developer Boehringer Ingelheim to design and sell several diabetes treatments.
Shares of Lilly climbed 21 cents to $56.82 in Tuesday morning trading after hitting a 52-week high price of $57.14 earlier in the session. The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose less than 1 percent.
