Octapharma to shift 300 jobs from Charlotte and invest $1.5 billion in Rock Hill

Swiss biopharmaceutical company Octapharma will invest $1.5 billion to build a U.S. headquarters and manufacturing campus in Rock Hill, a project that adds more than 1,200 new jobs to York County while pulling roughly 300 executive positions across the state line from Charlotte.

The company disclosed its identity at a June 29 York County Council public hearing tied to a tax incentive agreement, ending months during which the project moved through local approvals under the codename Project Palmetto Rock.

Combined new and relocated positions push the total above 1,500 — placing Octapharma among the largest economic development commitments in York County history.

The site chosen for the campus is Palmetto Research Park, the city-owned property off Interstate 77 at Exit 81 where the Carolina Panthers halted construction on a headquarters and practice facility four years ago after a funding dispute with Rock Hill.

The city later acquired more than 200 acres through the bankruptcy of GT Real Estate, the entity set up to handle the team’s Rock Hill business, and marketed the land to life sciences and advanced manufacturing prospects.

Construction is expected to begin late this year near the interchange added during the Panthers development.

$1.5 billion project reshapes York County’s economic profile

Octapharma’s plan, as detailed at Monday’s York County Council hearing, splits into a nearly $1.3 billion manufacturing facility and a $190 million corporate headquarters campus.

The Rock Hill site will add 3.5 million liters of plasma processing capacity — about a third of Octapharma’s worldwide capacity — and become the destination for plasma collected in the United States, which currently ships to Europe for manufacturing.

Roughly 88% of the company’s plasma donations originate in the U.S.

Wage levels are central to the deal. Headquarters positions will average more than $141,000 a year, while manufacturing jobs will average nearly $103,000, according to figures presented to the county.

The average wage in York County is $63,805, per U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data cited by county officials.

“With every product we make, there’s a life that hangs in the balance,” Octapharma Plasma Vice President Barry Pomeroy told the council. “And when our products leave here going to hospitals all over the world, York County’s name is going to be attached to them too.”

York County Councilman Tom Audette, a member of the county Economic Development Committee, said the wage floor is what makes the project consequential beyond its dollar figure. “The growth opportunity is big with this,” Audette said. “And it’s a type of company that will attract other good companies to this area.”

Rock Hill Mayor John Gettys said the city has spent four years turning down redevelopment offers for Palmetto Research Park in an effort to hold the property for higher-wage employers.

“We decided we wanted to use this asset, this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, to bring jobs to our community that don’t exist here now,” Gettys said.

The Octapharma commitment follows a separate deal finalized this month in which North Carolina-based Novant Health bought 25 acres within Palmetto Research Park for a planned $300 million medical campus.

Together, Gettys said, the two projects advance the city’s stated goal of becoming a life sciences and advanced manufacturing hub, aided by programs at York Technical College and Winthrop University and by joint economic development work with South Carolina and Charlotte partners.

York County Council gave initial approval to the Octapharma incentives earlier in June. A final vote is expected in July.

What Octapharma is — and what Charlotte loses

Octapharma is a privately held company founded in 1983 and headquartered in Lachen, Switzerland, southeast of Zurich.

Octapharma employs more than 11,000 people worldwide and generated about $4 billion in revenue last year. It bills itself as the world’s largest privately owned plasma fractionator, using proteins from human plasma to produce medicines and therapies for bleeding disorders, immune conditions and critical care patients.

The company operates five advanced manufacturing sites, all in Europe, and has offices in more than 30 countries.

Its existing U.S. footprint consists of offices in New Jersey and Florida. The Rock Hill campus will be its first U.S. headquarters and, according to elected and economic development officials, a combined corporate and manufacturing site of a type the company has not previously built in the country.

The 300 jobs moving from Charlotte belong to Octapharma Plasma, the company’s U.S. subsidiary, which runs a network of more than 180 plasma donation centers and is currently based off Westlake Drive in Charlotte.

Octapharma Plasma opened its first U.S. donation center in 2006 and has eight South Carolina locations, three of them in Columbia — none in the Rock Hill region.

The Charlotte facility includes a testing lab that will remain in place. The executive positions, however, will relocate to Rock Hill as part of the new headquarters campus.

For the Charlotte metro area, the 300-job shift is small in absolute terms relative to the region’s employment base, but it lands in a corridor where South Carolina has increasingly competed for the kind of high-wage headquarters roles Charlotte has historically anchored.

Octapharma and plasma

Plasma — the liquid portion of blood, containing water, enzymes, proteins, electrolytes and antibodies — cannot be manufactured.

Octapharma sources it from about 200,000 donors each month across more than 200 donation centers in the U.S. and Germany. Donors who pass a medical exam can be paid; first-time donors can earn up to $750 within 35 days, with amounts varying by donation volume, red blood cell levels and promotional offers.

The company reported more than 30 projects in its research and development pipeline last year and increased R&D investment 8.8% compared with 2024.

It operates seven clinical and preclinical research sites. Products range from hemophilia medications to hemostatic patches used by military forces to stop battlefield bleeding.

The Rock Hill project is being financed in part through a York County tax incentive package, and city officials have signaled that additional sites along Interstate 77 are being prepared with utilities and zoning changes intended to attract similar employers.

Gettys said the city expects more announcements to follow.

“We’ve got a real opportunity to bring these jobs, en masse, to this area,” he said.

This report was produced with the assistance of a proprietary tool powered by artificial intelligence and using our own originally reported, written and published content. It was reviewed and edited by our journalists. To learn more about how The Charlotte Observer is using AI in our newsroom, see our policy here.

This story was originally published July 2, 2026 at 5:06 AM with the headline "Octapharma to shift 300 jobs from Charlotte and invest $1.5 billion in Rock Hill."