Defying Big Pharma customs, one generic leap at a time

By TOM MARINER //

In an era when many domestic pharmaceutical companies have moved manufacturing offshore, one of America’s largest generic drugmakers has taken a decidedly different path.

Amneal Pharmaceuticals currently employs about 800 people in Suffolk County, and as the longtime pharma expands into advanced drug-device development – reinforcing Long Island as a center for both life sciences and advanced manufacturing – it may just be getting started.

This success story begins not on Long Island, but in India.

In the 1980s, entrepreneur Kanu Patel built an Ahmedabad-based pharmaceutical business focused on drug manufacturing, formulation and distribution. His sons, Chirag and Chintu, grew up around the pharmaceutical industry and developed an innate understanding of both the science and economics of medicine.

After immigrating to the United States, the brothers pursued careers in pharmacy and pharmaceutical operations. Working within established pharmaceutical-distribution channels, they became front-row witnesses to a challenge that continues to confront patients today: the high cost of prescription medications.

The brothers recognized that generic drugs could dramatically reduce healthcare costs, but only if manufacturers could reliably produce high-quality medicines at scale while meeting rigorous FDA standards.

In 2002, Chirag and Chintu founded Amneal Pharmaceuticals in the New York metropolitan area, before expanding operations into New Jersey. Their mission was straightforward: increase access to affordable medicines through high-quality generic pharmaceuticals.

Amneal received its first FDA approval in 2006 – covering a generic version of Metformin, a type 2 diabetes treatment – and quickly expanded its product portfolio. Unlike many competitors that relied heavily on outsourcing, the Patel brothers pursued a strategy centered on manufacturing excellence, investigating aggressively in state-of-the-art production facilities and product development.

Recognizing the Greater New York region’s skilled workforce, proximity to NYC capital and long history in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries, Amneal soon established operations in Suffolk County. Facilities in Hauppauge and Commack helped support the company’s early expansion, but an even larger vision was taking shape.

Beginning in the early 2010s, Amneal launched major investments in what would become one of the largest pharmaceutical manufacturing campuses on Long Island. Front and center was a significant expansion of its Yaphank operations, supported by New York State and Town of Brookhaven economic-development programs.

Within a few short years, Amneal had invested more than $60 million to expand its manufacturing, warehousing, laboratory and research facilities. The campus grew to more than 400,000 square feet and became a cornerstone of the company’s domestic manufacturing network.

Today, the Brookhaven-Yaphank campus manufactures generic pharmaceutical products distributed throughout the United States and internationally. The facility supports packaging, quality control, engineering, regulatory compliance and technical operations and employes roughly 800 professionals – chemists, engineers, manufacturing technicians, supply-chain experts, regulatory professionals and more.

In 2018, Amneal merged with Impax Laboratories in a transaction valued at $1.45 billion, a move that significantly increased its scale and product portfolio. But the company’s focus remained the same: affordable medicines, with upwards of 175 million annual prescriptions now flowing out its doors.

Today, the next chapter of the family-business mission is unfolding through “biosimilars.” While traditional generic drugs replicate small-molecule medicines, biosimilars provide lower-cost alternatives to complex biologic therapies used to treat cancer, autoimmune disorders and other serious conditions.

These products represent one of the most important opportunities to reduce healthcare costs in the coming decade – and Amneal has invested heavily in this future, primarily through New Jersey-based Kashiv BioSciences, another company recently acquired by the Patel family.

The $1.1 billion Kashiv acquisition strengthens Amneal’s capabilities in biosimilars, biologics, complex injectables and advanced drug-delivery systems. Much of this biosimilar development effort is centered in New Jersey, where Amneal continues to expand its research, development and commercialization capabilities – but the Patels have hardly forgotten about their Long Island base.

In 2025, Amneal announced a partnership with Connecticut-based ApiJect Systems to establish advanced drug-device manufacturing capabilities at the Yaphank campus. Combining the latest in pharma manufacturing and medical-device innovation, the project will manufacture sophisticated prefilled injectable delivery systems by leveraging ApiJect’s cutting-edge Blow-Fill-Seal technology.

Amneal says the collaboration will create approximately 200 additional jobs and significantly expand Long Island’s role in advanced healthcare manufacturing. But for Long Island’s life-sciences community, the significance of this effort extends well beyond a single company.

In a region often associated with research laboratories and corporate headquarters, Amneal has demonstrated that large-scale pharmaceutical manufacturing can also thrive on Long Island. The progressive company, now a $3 billion global distributor, shows clearly how innovations in manufacturing and workforce development can work together to create economic opportunity while addressing important socioeconomic challenges – and that lowering healthcare costs can go hand-in-hand with creating high-quality jobs.

Tom Mariner is the executive director of Bayport-based Long Island Bio.