While headlines today focus on a $3 billion expansion in Virginia, the most significant long-term commitment in Merck’s massive new $70 billion U.S. capital project wave is right here in New Jersey. The pharmaceutical giant, with its global headquarters firmly rooted in Rahway, has pledged to invest more than $3.5 billion into its flagship campus, an investment designed to cement the state’s standing as the irreplaceable core of the company’s worldwide research and development network.
The $70 billion commitment, beginning in 2025, represents a transformational push to expand domestic manufacturing, research, and capital infrastructure across the country. But for New Jersey, it signals a renewed dedication to the place where Merck’s modern story began, ensuring the next generation of scientific breakthroughs continues to originate from the Garden State.
Merck’s Oct. 20, 2025, announcement detailed the start of construction on a state-of-the-art, 400,000-square-foot Center of Excellence for Pharmaceutical Manufacturing at its Elkton, Virginia, site. This $3 billion facility is focused on bolstering small molecule manufacturing and testing—a crucial element of the U.S. drug supply chain.
The new facility is expected to create over 500 full-time roles and 8,000 construction jobs, leading Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin to declare it a “giant leap forward” for the Commonwealth’s life sciences sector. This emphasis on domestic manufacturing—including a recently completed $1 billion vaccine facility in North Carolina and a $1 billion biologics center in Delaware—is a direct response to national efforts to fortify the production and distribution of U.S. medicines.
“This investment helps advance our goal of providing new, innovative treatment options for people facing serious health challenges in the U.S. and around the world,” Robert Davis, chairman and chief executive officer of Merck said.
While manufacturing capacity is expanding across the U.S., the intellectual capital remains concentrated in Rahway. Merck’s concurrent commitment to its global headquarters is the largest single-site capital expenditure mentioned in the announcement, underscoring New Jersey’s critical value to the company’s future.
The Rahway investment of more than $3.5 billion is aimed squarely at the research and clinical manufacturing side of the business. This funding is designed to modernize and expand the laboratories and facilities where drug candidates are first tested, developed, and prepared for clinical trials—the earliest and most vital stages of pharmaceutical innovation.
This move is not merely an infrastructure upgrade; it is an economic anchor. The $3.5 billion project is expected to generate roughly 1,000 new, high-value jobs in Rahway, specifically within the highly skilled fields of research and clinical manufacturing. These roles—scientists, engineers, and clinical specialists—represent the long-term, knowledge-economy jobs that form the foundation of New Jersey’s powerful biopharma sector.
New Jersey’s legacy as a scientific hub
Merck’s choice to consolidate and heavily invest in its Rahway base is a reaffirmation of the state’s deep-seated role in global health innovation. The Rahway campus is more than just an address; it is the birthplace of Merck Research Laboratories, tracing its legacy back over a century.
New Jersey’s unique ecosystem—a high concentration of world-class research universities, a skilled scientific workforce, and proximity to major financial and governmental centers—makes it an unparalleled location for the world’s most research-intensive biopharmaceutical company. By prioritizing research and clinical manufacturing at its Rahway headquarters, Merck ensures that its strategic vision for the future remains tethered to its historic home.
The 1,000 anticipated new jobs in Rahway, coupled with the billions in capital expenditure, will act as a powerful economic catalyst, supporting local businesses and strengthening the municipal tax base in Rahway and the surrounding Union County area. This sustained commitment reinforces the state’s efforts to cultivate a competitive, high-tech economy that is attractive to global industry leaders.
A broader national footprint
The Rahway investment fits into a national blueprint that seeks to create a more resilient and geographically distributed supply chain. The company’s total manufacturing investment this year alone is nearly $6 billion, including:
- Wilmington, Delaware: A $1 billion biologics center for next-generation therapies.
- Durham, North Carolina: A completed $1 billion expansion of vaccine production.
- De Soto, Kansas: An $895 million expansion for Animal Health manufacturing.
In total, Merck’s coast-to-coast capital campaign is forecasted to create over 48,000 construction-related opportunities by 2029, in addition to more than 1,600 new permanent, full-time jobs at its manufacturing and R&D sites.
While other states may be gaining new factories, New Jersey is retaining and expanding the ultimate source of Merck’s value: its research and development engine. The over $3.5 billion commitment to the Rahway headquarters ensures that New Jersey remains the crucial, sophisticated center where life-changing medicines and vaccines are first conceived and taken from lab bench to clinical trial. For New Jersey, the story is not about manufacturing; it is about anchoring the future of global pharmaceutical discovery.
