Serologicals Corp. will begin construction of its new Lawrence biotechnology plant in March and will open the $28 million facility in the first half of 2004, company officials said at a ground-breaking ceremony Wednesday.

“We’re not hoping to have it open in the first half of 2004. We will have it open by then,” Bud Ingalls, the company’s chief financial officer, said. “It is really important that we have this plant up and running on time.”

Ingalls, and David Dodd, the company’s chief executive, traveled from the company’s headquarters in suburban Atlanta to attend the ceremony, sponsored by the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce.

Dodd said the Lawrence plant, which will make an additive used by pharmaceutical companies in the production of a variety of drugs, represented the largest investment the company has made in a single facility.

“This plant clearly will be the foundation for us for quite some time,” Dodd said.

The ground-breaking ceremony came one day after Lawrence city commissioners approved an 80 percent, 10-year tax abatement for the company to build its 43,000-square-foot facility on a 12.5-acre site in the East Hills Business Park.

The facility is expected to employ 40 people with an annual salary of $47,000 a year. The company projects that within three years, the plant will employ 60 people.

The plant will be the largest manufacturer of the company’s fastest-growing product, Ex-Cyte. The product is used by many biopharmaceutical companies to increase the rate of growth of certain types of cells that are used in the development of various drugs. The increased cell growth allows the companies to produce the drugs more quickly and more efficiently.

Serologicals has described Ex-Cyte as being a type of “Miracle Grow” for the pharmaceutical industry. Douglas County Commissioner Bob Johnson said he thought that was an appropriate description of what Serologicals’ decision to build in Lawrence would mean to the community.

Kansas Lt. Gov. John Moore, left, and David Dodd, chief executive of Serologicals Corp., visit before a ground-breaking ceremony at the site of a new Serologicals plant in the East Hills Business Park. The ceremony was Wednesday.

“I think Serologicals will become our community’s ‘Miracle Grow,'” Johnson said at the ceremony. “Their decision to locate here in Lawrence will really put us in a great position to expand our life sciences industry.”

Serologicals, which is publicly traded on the Nasdaq market, is the first major biosciences company to build a production facility in Lawrence.

Lt. Gov. John Moore, who also serves as the state’s secretary of commerce and housing, said he thought Lawrence was now in a good position to capitalize off of the growing life sciences initiative taking off in the Kansas City metro area.

“There seems to be a natural relationship between the University of Kansas and the Kansas City life sciences movement,” Moore said at the event. “That offers tremendous opportunity for Lawrence. I think this will be the first of many such events for Lawrence.”

Serologicals officials have said they chose Lawrence over 29 other Midwestern cities in large part because they believed Kansas University would provide a good supply of skilled employees, who will need to have a strong education in the life sciences.

¢ 6News video: Serologicals break ground for new plant¢ 6News video: Commission approves Serologicals abatement(1-29-03)¢ Sizing up Serologicals (1-19-03)¢ Serologicals touts plans for plant (1-9-03)¢ Serologicals gets favorable rating for tax-abatement prospects (1-4-03)¢ Serologicals files for tax break (12-18-02)

The company announced its plans to locate in Lawrence in early December.

Kelvin Heck, the chamber’s chairman, said the fact that the project moved along so quickly was a positive sign the community’s new economic development efforts were working well. Approximately two years ago, a failed proposal to locate an American Eagle Outfitters warehouse in Lawrence drew heavy opposition and created a lengthy debate among government officials.

“It took a lot of people saying the same things at the same time to make this project happen. For once in Lawrence’s history, we all did say the same things at the same time,” Heck said. “It is funny now, but it wasn’t so funny a few years ago.

“But I think this project is a real positive sign because we saw what we wanted and we went after it together.”