Eli Lilly and Company: Difference between revisions

[[File:Eli Lilly and Company Headquarters ca1919 b1007511 003 tif zs25x9459.png | thumb|right |Eli Lilly and Company Headquarters, Indianapolis, {{circa}} 1919]]

Just before and after World War I, the Eli Lilly and Company experienced rapid change. Expansion of Lilly's manufacturing facilities at the McCarty Street plant improved production capacity with a new Science Building (Building 14), opened in 1911, and a new capsule plant (Building 15) in 1913. The company also began constructions of the [[Lilly Biological Laboratories]], a research and manufacturing plant on 150 acres near Greenfield, Indiana, in 1913.

In addition to development of new medicines, the company achieved several technological advances, including automation of its production facilities. Lilly was also an innovator in pill capsule manufacturing. It was among the first manufacturers to insert medications into empty gelatin capsules, which provided a more exact dosage. Lilly manufactured capsules for its own needs and sold its excess capacity to others. A 1917 ''Scientific American'' article claimed the Lilly operation in Indianapolis was "the largest capsule factory in the world" and was "capable of producing 2.5 million capsules a day". One of Lilly's innovations was fruit flavoring for medicines and sugar-coated pills to make their medicines easier to swallow. Over the next few years the company began to create tens of millions of capsules and pills annually.

[[File:Belladonna cultivation Hand book of pharmacy and therapeutics b1007511 005 tif 5x21tg304.tiff|thumb|right|Belladonna cultivation, Eli Lilly and Company, 1919]]

Other advances improved plant efficiency and eliminated production errors. Eli Lilly, grandson of the company founder, introduced a method for blueprinting manufacturing tickets in 1909. This process, which created multiples copies of a drug formula, helped eliminate manufacturing and transcription errors. In the 1920s Eli introduced the new concept of straight-line production, where raw materials entered at one end of the facility and the finished product came out the other end, in the company's manufacturing process. Under Eli's supervision, the design for Building 22, a new 5-floor plant that opened in Indianapolis in 1926, implemented the straight-line concept to improve production efficiency and lower production costs. One historian noted, "It was probably the most sophisticated production system in the American pharmaceutical industry." This more efficient manufacturing process also allowed the company to hire a regular workforce. Instead of recalling workers at peak times and laying them off when production demand fell, Lilly's regular workforce produced less-costly medicines in off-peak times using the same manufacturing facilities.

[[File:Views in Elastic Filled Capsule Department b1007511 008 tif bn999778q.tiff|thumb|right|Men and women workers preparing drug capsules, Eli Lilly and Company, 1919]]

During the 1920s the introduction of new products also brought the company financial success. In 1919 Josiah hired biochemist [[George Henry Alexander Clowes]] as director of biochemical research.

In 1921 three [[University of Toronto]] scientists, [[John Macleod (physiologist)|John Macleod]], [[Frederick Banting]], and [[Charles Best (medical scientist)|Charles Best]], were working on the development of [[insulin]] for treatment of diabetes. Clowes proposed a collaboration with the researchers in December 1921, then again March and May 1922. The researchers were hesitant to work with a commercial drug firm, particularly since they had the [[Connaught Laboratories]]' non-commercial facilities at hand. Nonetheless, as limits were reached at the scale to which Connaught could produce insulin, Clowes and Eli Lilly met with the researchers in 1922 to negotiate an agreement with the [[University of Toronto]] scientists to mass-produce insulin.

In 1923, Lilly began selling Iletin (Insulin, Lilly), their tradename for the first commercially available insulin product in the U.S for the treatment of diabetes. Numerous objections were registered by the Insulin Committee of the University of Toronto in regard to Lilly's use of the term "Iletin", although production continued under this name and the objection was later dropped "as a concession".

Banting and Macleod won a Nobel Prize in 1923 for their research, which they subsequently shared with co-discoverers [[Charles Best (medical scientist)|Charles Best]] and [[James Collip]]. Insulin, "the most important drug" in the company's history, did "more than any other" to make Lilly "one of the major pharmaceutical manufacturers in the world."

The success of insulin enabled the company to attract well-respected scientists and, with them, make more medical advances. By its fiftieth anniversary in 1926 sales reached $9 million and the company produced more than 2,800 different items.

In 1928, Lilly introduced Liver Extract 343 for the treatment of pernicious anemia, a blood disorder, in a joint venture with two [[Harvard University]] scientists, [[George R. Minot]] and [[William P. Murphy]]. In 1930, Lilly introduced Liver Extract No. 55 in collaboration with [[George Whipple]], a [[University of Rochester]] scientist. Minot, Murphy, and Whipple won the 1934 Nobel Prize in medicine for their research.

Despite the economic challenges of the Great Depression, Lilly's sales rose to $13 million in 1932. That same year [[Eli Lilly (industrialist, born 1885)|Eli Lilly]], the eldest grandson of Col. Lilly, was named as the company's president to succeed his father, who remained as chairman of the board until 1948. Eli joined the family business in 1909. In his early years at the company Eli was especially interested in improving production efficiency and introduced a number of labor-saving devices. He also introduced scientific management principles and implemented cost-savings measures that modernized the company. In addition Eli was involved in expanding the company's research efforts and collaborations with university researchers.

In 1934, the firm opened two new facilities on the McCarty Street complex: a replica of Lilly's 1876 laboratory and the new [[Lilly Research Laboratories]], "one of the most fully equipped facilities in the world." In the 1930s the company also continued expansion overseas. In 1934, Eli Lilly and Company Limited, the company's first overseas subsidiary was established in [[England]], with headquarters in [[London]] and a manufacturing plant in [[Basingstoke, England|Basingstoke]].