VOLUME 14 NUMBER 10 ■ COLUMBIABUSINESSREPORT.COM
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JULY 19-AUGUST 15, 2021 ■ $2.25
Nephron Nitrile to help onshore PPE production in S.C. By Melinda Waldrop Mwaldrop@scbiznews.com
Staycation time
Capital City/Lake Murray region ranked top stop. Page 2
W
est Columbia-based Nephron Pharmaceutical Corp. is launching Nephron Nitrile, a new company that will produce three billion nitrile gloves per year at its Saxe-Gotha Industrial Park facility. The gloves, a crucial piece of the PPE needed by medical, health care and other industries during the COVID-19 pandemic, will be manufactured in the newly completed Kennedy Innovation Complex, part of Nephron’s $215.8 million
expansion at its Lexington County headquarters. Nephron is teaming up with CeramTec, a global ceramic and medical technology company with North American headquarters in Laurens, to produce the gloves. CeramTec makes the forms used in molding the gloves. Nephron owner and CEO Lou Kennedy, whose company faced supply chain issues in getting the PPE it needed to operate at the height of the pandemic, said Nephron Nitrile will help onshore future production not just in America but in South Carolina. “Here you have two South Carolina companies
joining forces to create PPE statewide, just the exact way that (Sen.) Lindsey Graham talked about in his press conference from the Nephron lobby last year,” Kennedy said. “I am so proud of this.” Kennedy spoke to the Columbia Regional Business Report in advance of a July 15 news conference announcing the formation of Nephron Nitrile. The news conference occurred after the July 19 print edition of the Business Report went to press. Kennedy said her company has also entered See NITRILE, Page 12
Growing roots
Hydroponics company expands to Atlanta. Page 3
Hospitality help
Federal program pays out $28.6B to bars, restaurants. Page 4
Business boost
MARKET MAYHEM
S.C. agricultural department funds seven startups. Page 6
Lack of inventory, low interest rates driving sight-unseen purchases, cash-only offers
INSIDE
Upfront................................. 2 SC Biz News Briefs................. 3 In Focus: Residential Real Estate......................... 14 List: Mortgage Companies .......................................... 17 At Work............................... 21 Viewpoint............................23
Photo/Christina Lee Knauss
By Christina Lee Knauss
C
Contributing Writer
olumbia realtor Graeme Moore, owner of The Moore Co., recently had an experience that would be considered highly unusual in almost any other recent era of real estate sales except this one.
He sold an expensive home to a couple moving to Columbia from across the country for work who had never even physically seen the home before or walked around inside it. “We had met before and looked at some houses in person, but on that trip, they didn’t find anything that worked,” Moore said. “They couldn’t swing coming back out here again
Mounting costs
Rising prices of lumber, other materials putting squeeze on affordable housing market . Page 18
because of issues with work and their kids, so they ended up having to buy basically sight unseen, using only photos and a video.” Buying a house without ever seeing it in person isn’t the only unusual thing going on in the real estate market these days. See MARKET, Page 15