A Utah-based company is converting the vacant former Arcimoto electric-vehicle factory in west Eugene into a facility making bags of intravenous fluids for medical centers around the country.
The business will have about 100 workers and use the Chambers Street manufacturing complex’s main 150,000-square-foot building, says Charles Oaxaca Hall, president at Salt Lake City-based Haven Integrated Pharmacy Operations.
“We’re going to be making intravenous solutions for hospitals, saline bags, hydration bags,” Oaxaca Hall tells Eugene Weekly. Oaxaca Hall, a doctor of pharmacy, oversees Haven’s Utah programs making and administering sterile solutions and compounds for infusion via drip bags or injection.
Haven has already leased the space from a company that last month bought the Eugene factory site, records show.
The facility would become one of only a handful of IV fluid makers in the United States.
It’s big news for Eugene’s bio-science sector, and hasn’t previously been reported.
Hurricane damage
Most IV fluids in the U.S. are made at Baxter International Inc.’s huge plant in North Carolina, according to news reports. Hurricane Helene in September 2024 severely damaged that site, causing shortages of IV fluids at hospitals and other medical facilities nationwide, highlighting the fragility of the supply system.
Haven’s move is driven partly by that, Oaxaca Hall says.
Haven has already secured supply agreements with some hospitals for the anticipated output of the Eugene facility and is seeking more, Oaxaca Hall says.
IV fluids are widely used at many health care sites. They are typically delivered by a drip line and a catheter in a patient’s bloodstream. Common IV fluid uses include medication and nutrition delivery, such as electrolyte replacements and dextrose solutions, as well as specialized formulations for individual patients.
When the Eugene facility will be equipped, start hiring or open have not been disclosed.
The facility would apparently be the only IV fluids factory in Oregon.
Arcimoto upgrades
The news is a twist in the Arcimoto factory saga.
The complex, two blocks south of the Eugene Mission homeless shelter, is one of the largest vacant factories in the south Willamette Valley, with its main 150,000-square-foot structure plus smaller, older buildings.
Eugene-based EV maker Arcimoto bought the property in 2021 to expand EV production. Arcimoto spent millions of dollars upgrading the electrical, HVAC and air filtration systems in the main building. But Arcimoto floundered financially and shut the place. It surrendered the property to a Chicago-based creditor, Hilco Global, in 2024. Ever since, Hilco has tried to sell the place, asking $10 million.
Intricate deal
Last month it finally sold. The transaction was a tad complex: On July 21, Hilco sold the property to Focus Infusions LLC of Gold Beach, Oregon, for an undisclosed amount, according to the deed. Focus Infusions is newly created, formed in December 2024 by Gold Beach real estate broker Joshua Stout, according to business records.
Focus Infusions then immediately sold the property to SJR Capital Partners LLC of Utah, also for an undisclosed price, according to the deed. SJR Capital Partners is a new company, formed in April of this year by Utah CPA and investor Jared Stone.
Also in July, using the factory as collateral, SJR Capital took out a $12,755,500 loan from a Seattle commercial lender, records show. The money presumably was to pay for the purchase, and possibly also to fund equipping the IV fluids factory. The records don’t specify.
The filings also show Haven Integrated Pharmacy has already signed a lease for the facility.
Mysteries
Much remains unknown about the project.
The companies involved, including Haven, appear to be small or start-up type ventures. Other than Oaxaca Hall, no executives responded to Eugene Weekly phone calls or emails.
The IV fluids industry is a highly regulated, high-volume, low-profit business, according to news reports. In the United States it is dominated by a few big corporate-owned factories, news reports say.
The Haven venture would join Lane County’s budding bio-science sector. The county is home to 190 bio-science companies, many of them tiny start-ups, including spinouts from the University of Oregon, according to the Lane Workforce Partnership’s 2024 report. The sector has a total of 1,473 workers, with an average wage of $89,000, says the report.
Bricks $ Mortar is a column anchored by Christian Wihtol, who worked as an editor and writer at The Register-Guard in Eugene 1990-2018, much of the time focused on real estate, economic development and business. Reach him at Christian@EugeneWeekly.com.