Polykon’s facility will be built off this road in White Oak Technology Park.
Lured by a change in the county’s tax code and a grant from the governor’s office, a cosmetics and pharmaceutical ingredients company is ramping up its plans for a new facility in Henrico.
Polykon Manufacturing LLC last month purchased a 22.75-acre lot in the White Oak Technology Park from Henrico County Economic Development Authority. The company, a joint venture between Seppic Inc. and Schülke Inc., paid $1.54 million for the land in a deal that closed May 3.
Gary McLaren, executive director at the EDA, said development of Polykon’s Henrico operation will take place in two phases, the first of which will cost $60 million and create 50 jobs. He said Henrico has already approved plans for an approximately 50,000-square-foot facility and work is expected to begin by July.
Gary McLaren
McLaren said Polykon’s plans to buy land in eastern Henrico were announced in February. Seppic and Schülke are Europe-based subsidiaries for a cosmetics and pharmaceutical ingredients manufacturer called Air Liquide Healthcare, which has had operations in Chesterfield County and Prince William County for the past 10 years.
McLaren said the Polykon deal got started when Cushman & Wakefield Business Incentives Practice, a Chicago-based venture that helped with Seppic’s search for a U.S. manufacturing site, called the Greater Richmond Partnership, which then searched for sites locally.
“It got very quickly down to local details,” McLaren said, adding Henrico officials met with Seppic in February 2014 for site visits and dinner. “It came down between Henrico and somewhere in Ohio.”
According to a release by the governor’s office, Gov. Terry McAuliffe met with Seppic officials at the company’s Paris headquarters in June 2015.
McLaren said the venture that was eventually formed by Seppic and Schülke was persuaded by several incentives associated with the Henrico site. During talks with Polykon in 2015, Henrico lowered by 70 percent its machine and tool tax. The state plans to eventually give Polykon a $700,000 Virginia Investment Partnership grant, and the county extended a road to make the site at 6201 Engineered Wood Way accessible, McLaren said.
McLaren said Seppic sells its products to companies that manufacture major cosmetic lines and healthcare products. Schülke designs and supplies antiseptics and disinfectants for medical use and preservatives for personal care products.
“We’re looking for manufacturing,” McLaren said of Henrico. “Manufacturing is beginning to come back, especially high-value manufacturing.”
White Oak Technology Park sits on 2,300 acres in eastern Henrico that is about 80 percent vacant, McLaren said. Companies that currently operate at White Oak include QTS, which has a data center at the park, Bank of America, Anord Control Systems Ltd. and Lumber Liquidators.
Polykon’s facility will be built off this road in White Oak Technology Park.
Lured by a change in the county’s tax code and a grant from the governor’s office, a cosmetics and pharmaceutical ingredients company is ramping up its plans for a new facility in Henrico.
Polykon Manufacturing LLC last month purchased a 22.75-acre lot in the White Oak Technology Park from Henrico County Economic Development Authority. The company, a joint venture between Seppic Inc. and Schülke Inc., paid $1.54 million for the land in a deal that closed May 3.
Gary McLaren, executive director at the EDA, said development of Polykon’s Henrico operation will take place in two phases, the first of which will cost $60 million and create 50 jobs. He said Henrico has already approved plans for an approximately 50,000-square-foot facility and work is expected to begin by July.
Gary McLaren
McLaren said Polykon’s plans to buy land in eastern Henrico were announced in February. Seppic and Schülke are Europe-based subsidiaries for a cosmetics and pharmaceutical ingredients manufacturer called Air Liquide Healthcare, which has had operations in Chesterfield County and Prince William County for the past 10 years.
McLaren said the Polykon deal got started when Cushman & Wakefield Business Incentives Practice, a Chicago-based venture that helped with Seppic’s search for a U.S. manufacturing site, called the Greater Richmond Partnership, which then searched for sites locally.
“It got very quickly down to local details,” McLaren said, adding Henrico officials met with Seppic in February 2014 for site visits and dinner. “It came down between Henrico and somewhere in Ohio.”
According to a release by the governor’s office, Gov. Terry McAuliffe met with Seppic officials at the company’s Paris headquarters in June 2015.
McLaren said the venture that was eventually formed by Seppic and Schülke was persuaded by several incentives associated with the Henrico site. During talks with Polykon in 2015, Henrico lowered by 70 percent its machine and tool tax. The state plans to eventually give Polykon a $700,000 Virginia Investment Partnership grant, and the county extended a road to make the site at 6201 Engineered Wood Way accessible, McLaren said.
McLaren said Seppic sells its products to companies that manufacture major cosmetic lines and healthcare products. Schülke designs and supplies antiseptics and disinfectants for medical use and preservatives for personal care products.
“We’re looking for manufacturing,” McLaren said of Henrico. “Manufacturing is beginning to come back, especially high-value manufacturing.”
White Oak Technology Park sits on 2,300 acres in eastern Henrico that is about 80 percent vacant, McLaren said. Companies that currently operate at White Oak include QTS, which has a data center at the park, Bank of America, Anord Control Systems Ltd. and Lumber Liquidators.