Fareva, a privately-held international contract manufacturing firm that operates in four business segments—homecare and industrial, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and food, will acquire and invest $42 million in Pfizer’s consumer products manufacturing site on Darbytown Road in Eastern Henrico County, state and local officials announced this morning. Fareva will continue to operate the facility, which manufactures and packages brand-name products such as Advil, Chapstick and Robitussin.

Pfizer and Fareva also have reached a manufacturing and supply agreement that will enable the plant to continue production of Pfizer consumer products for the global marketplace. All of the nearly 500 Pfizer colleagues that are employed at the site will transfer to Fareva, and an additional 90 positions will be added.

“Fareva’s acquisition of the Pfizer plant and retention of approximately 500 jobs is tremendous for Henrico County and the Commonwealth," Gov. Bob McDonnell said. "This project is also significant because well-known Pfizer products will continue to be manufactured at the facility as Fareva expands into the North American market with its first U.S. site.”

“We are thrilled that Pfizer and Fareva were able to strike this agreement and both retain and expand the Henrico County manufacturing plant,” said Jim Cheng, Virginia Secretary of Commerce and Trade. “I look forward to the inevitable growth of this partnership that builds on Pfizer’s brand success while opening Fareva to the U.S market.”

Headquartered in Luxembourg, Fareva employs 5,500 colleagues and reported $1.2 billion in revenues in 2010. The company operates 28 manufacturing facilities in Europe and emerging markets.

Speaking about the pending acquisition, Fareva’s Chief Executive Officer Bernard Fraisse stated, “We have been looking for the right opportunity to expand our manufacturing footprint into North America and establish our pharmaceutical and cosmetics businesses in the United States. The Henrico County site has a talented and motivated workforce and state-of-the-art manufacturing, packaging and warehousing facilities that are a perfect fit for growing our commercial portfolio in this region.”

The Virginia Economic Development Partnership worked with Henrico County to secure the project for Virginia. McDonnell approved a $650,000 grant from the Governor’s Opportunity Fund to assist Henrico County with the project. McDonnell also approved an $800,000 performance-based grant from the Virginia Investment Partnership (VIP) program, an incentive available to existing Virginia companies. Through its Virginia Jobs Investment Program, the Virginia Department of Business Assistance will provide funding and services to support the company’s recruitment, training and retraining activities.

“Henrico County is very pleased to welcome another international company to our community,” said Frank Thornton, chairman of Henrico County Board of Supervisors. “We are grateful to Fareva for acquiring this plant and saving important jobs, and we look forward to partnering with the company as they add additional jobs and investment. Their plan to diversify the plant’s product mix by adding cosmetics is a real plus.”