Palmetto State Draws
Biotech Relocations

The tranquil, artistic port city of Charleston has an abundance of nicknames. It is often referred to as The Holy City for its many churches. Many locals affectionately call it "Chucktown." If a current trend accelerates, it may soon be known as Bio City. Charleston is quietly assembling an impressive biotech cluster, aided by the presence of the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) and the region's attractive quality-of-life features. The area added two young firms in recent months and more moves are apparently in the works.

Dr. Floyd "Ski" Chilton is founder of Pilot Therapeutics.

        The latest firm to move to S.C. Low Country is Pilot Therapeutics, a four-year-old company moving from Winston-Salem, N.C. Pilot is locating its $2-million headquarters and R&D facility in Charleston and will build an $8-million plant in Orangeburg. Pilot is developing a wide range of pharmaceutical and over-the-counter medical food products, including Airozin, for the dietary management of asthma.
        Dr. Floyd "Ski" Chilton, Pilot's founder, president and CEO, says Charleston itself is a major draw. He says Daniel Island is a perfect setting for a biotech cluster.
        "Charleston's incredible," Chilton says. "It is a diverse community with a creative work force and we believe it will be easy for us to recruit employees. It's also important for a company such as Pilot to be close to a major medical center like MUSC."
        For its manufacturing facility, Pilot will locate in an industrial park in Orangeburg at the intersection of I-26 and Highway 301. He says the high-visibility site will help in branding a new product.
        "We are about to launch a product in the early spring for asthma," Chilton says. "It's important to be in a visible place. Orangeburg also has good colleges in South Carolina State and Claflin University."
        Chilton, a former researcher at Johns Hopkins and Wake Forest, founded the company based on about 40 patents developed at the two universities. He says the Charleston facility will eventually employ 100 while 80 will work in Orangeburg.

CropTech, a young company that uses tobacco plants to produce therapies for human diseases, is moving from Blacksburg, Va., to Charleston, S.C. The company's headquarters and R&D labs are slated to open in April. J.D. Brooks (inset) is senior vice president and chief operating officer of CropTech.

        A few months prior to the Pilot announcement, South Carolina's biotech effort got a most welcome shot in the arm when CropTech elected to move from Blacksburg, Va., to Charleston. The company is building a new headquarters and large scale manufacturing facility to commercialize its patented protein manufacturing technology, which uses specially prepared tobacco plants as molecular "factories" to produce biotech therapies for human diseases. The company employs this technology for a growing list of clients, including biotech companies Amgen and Immunex, as well as for its own development in therapies for cancer and other diseases.
        J.D. Brooks, CropTech's senior vice president and chief operating officer, says his company chose Charleston for its great quality of life and its access to infrastructure supporting the biotech industry. Because of its need for tobacco as a feedstock, Brooks says the site search focused on the tobacco-growing states of the Southeast.

South Carolina 2003: A Demographic Profile Population: 4,087,922 Pop. Growth(1990-2002): 17.24% Households: 1,566,027 Housing Units: 1,785,268 Median Household Size: 2.7 Home Ownership: 64.6% Median Monthly Rent: 406.0 Median Monthly Mortgage: 628.0 Median Household Income: 37,915 Per Capita Income: 23,134 Percent with College Degree: 16.2% Total Work Force: 1,940,658 Total Crime Index (US avg. = 100): 146.0 Annual Avg. Temperature: 62.8° F Annual Spending Per Capita: 15,907.8 Consumer Price Index: 146.3 EASI Quality of Life Index: 108.0 Source: Development Alliance (www.developmentalliance.com)

        "Charleston is a beautiful place to live, the climate is good and it has all the conveniences of a city, but the charm of a small town," Brooks says.
        CropTech, formed in 1992, will initially employ 30, but Brooks says the company will eventually provide jobs for more than 100 as its new corporate campus becomes a center for biotechnology. The $40-million project's 115,000-sq.-ft. (10,700-sq.-m.) first phase – which includes administrative offices, R&D labs and a bioprocessing and purification facility – will be finished in April. Later, the company will build greenhouses at the site, which Brooks says has plenty of room for expansion.
        Chilton believes the moves of CropTech and Pilot will draw more biotech investment to the state.
        "There's no question it will attract other companies," he says. "It's already happening, but I can't go into details. We were courted by several states and we saw a lot of different operations. South Carolina's economic development effort is a well-oiled machine."