The end of March was a pretty great moment for Greater Peoria. On March 28, a nice-sized crowd gathered in Pekin City Hall to celebrate the signing of closing documents that will allow Epic Medical to build their first North American manufacturing center. Epic, a Singapore-based medical device innovator and manufacturer, plans to invest over $25 million to build a facility where they will make, fill, and seal IV bags for use at hospitals across the US. Epic already does significant business in America, and this will allow them to be closer to distributors and customers. They plan to hire around 100 people once they are rolling. The closing ceremony was great, but the work that led up to it was even better.
Pekin Mayor Mary Burress, left, and Epic Medical Founder and CEO Freddie Lee Shake Hands After Signing
The term “Team Illinois” gets thrown around a lot in our economic development circles, but it is absolutely true. Things like this do not just happen and there is never just one person who gets the credit for “landing the big one.” Economic development is truly a team sport, and the teammates on this project were all stars. The start came from Intersect Illinois, the state’s business development lead. From the initial Request for Information in late 2024, which garnered dozens of responses from across the state, to the last days of negotiation, Intersect was there to serve the client and help coordinate the effort. A special thanks to Lenora Fisher of Intersect. Ironically, Lenora used to be a member of Team GPEDC and, in fact, was our Director of Business Attraction. It was extra special to see her get a win in her home community.
A lot of praise needs to be directed to the City of Pekin, too. They owned the 66 acres of land in Riverway Business Park that attracted Epic. Their staff moved quickly to negotiate a fair deal, and the City Council voted unanimously on the package. Their flexibility, responsiveness and creativity were key to making this all work. Josh Wray, Pekin’s Economic Development Director, did yeoman’s work and is the ultimate professional. Singapore is 13 hours ahead of Pekin, which meant Josh was often participating in 5 am meetings. His dedication to this was amazing.
Lots of other teammates also played their parts well. Like Josh, Sal Garza and Joe McKeown of Illinois DCEO hosted “after hours” web calls with Epic to ensure their application for the state’s EDGE tax credit incentive was complete and accurate. DCEO’s whole team worked hard to be responsive and moved the application through their refined and streamlined process at record speed. Since Epic will be building a saline plant within their facility, the quality and quantity of water was critical. Thanks to our friends at Illinois American Water were able to ensure that Epic had nothing to worry about. Ameren Illinois jumped in to help everyone understand the capacity and availability of both electricity and natural gas to serve Epic’s needs.
There is one more member of the team to hail: Epic Medical itself. International expansions are usually handled by a site selector – a consultant hired to find and evaluate potential locations. But Epic chose to do the search themselves and entrusted the task to Abhay Raut, their Commercial Director. While we had a whole team, Abhay was mostly on his own. But by the end of the process, it felt like we were all on the same team. His dedication to doing the right thing for his company while understanding our local needs was refreshing. He never argued or pushed, just stated his needs and understood ours. I’m looking forward to working with him in the building phase.
At the press conference, I noted that this project was not just a win for Pekin but a win for Greater Peoria (and, in fact, Illinois). While the facility will be in Pekin, the employees, contractors, and suppliers will come from across the region. And we feel that this project is just the tip of the iceberg. Companies invest in places that are being invested in, and Epic choosing Greater Peoria is a signal to others that there is something special here. I’m looking forward to writing more articles like this.
Chris Setti at speaking at the Press Conference