The contract manufacturer of sterile injectable products for the pharmaceutical industry plans to use the financing to support the momentum the company gained over the last year, said President and CEO Tom Ross.

Grand River Aseptic more than tripled its annual revenues in that period, he said.

“We’re really excited and proud of what we can accomplish and to create a thriving life sciences company here on the banks of the Grand River,” Ross told MiBiz. “We want to support that (investment) by continuing to grow. We’re lucky enough to have a strong investor base that wants to continue to support the company.”

Specifically, Grand River Aseptic has invested a portion of the money into purchasing new sterile water injection equipment and additional redundancy technology such as filters, pumps and other systems, Ross said.

The company also plans to use a portion of the funds to support additional hiring. Grand River Aseptic employs 120 workers — more than twice the people it employed in 2014 — and plans to continue to hire workers as new contracts come online, Ross said.

Grand River Aseptic generated more than $10 million in revenue in 2015, he said.

The company raised $1.1 million of a possible $2 million, according to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The manufacturer’s latest fundraising follows a $9.8 million round of financing in 2014, led by the Municipal Employee’s Retirement System of Michigan, as MiBiz reported at the time. The company used that investment to add new customers to its contract manufacturing business.

Ross expected Grand River Aseptic to continue along a strong growth trajectory as pharmaceutical companies increasingly turn to contract manufacturers to reduce overhead costs and help bring products to market.

The global pharmaceutical contract manufacturing market is expected to grow to $84 billion by 2020, according to a March 2016 report published by market research firm Mordor Intelligence. At the same time, global pharmaceutical sales are expected to reach $1.61 trillion in 2018, up from $1.23 trillion in 2014, according to a global life sciences outlook report published last year by Deloitte.

“Products are selling well in the market, and we’re excited about being able to respond to that and continue to increase our output,” Ross said.