South Carolina’s governor announced on May 13 that a primary metals manufacturer was heading to Fairfield County. That same day, a site selection company released a report on the economic impact of such businesses.
Mega Metal, headquartered in Turkey, selected the site just north of Columbia for its first location in the Palmetto State. The copper wire manufacturer’s facility is a $34 million investment, creating 135 jobs.
“Congratulations to Mega Metal on establishing its first South Carolina location,” said Gov. Henry McMaster (R) in the news release. “Manufacturing is thriving in South Carolina, and I’m confident Mega Metal will be well-positioned with our strong workforce.”
The announcement coincided with the Global Location Strategies (GLS) release of its 2025 Best Places for Primary Metals Manufacturing. Three locations in South Carolina are in the top 25 locations out of 387 metro areas in the U.S.: Spartanburg at #15, Greenville/Anderson/Greer at #20, and Charleston/North Charleston tied for #24 with Louisville/Jefferson County, Ky./Ind.
Georgia has four in the top 25: Savannah and Atlanta/Sandy Springs/Roswell are tied at #8. Gainesville follows at #13. Augusta is ranked #21.
Didi Caldwell, President and CEO of GLS, told ABD that the Southeast, and Georgia and South Carolina in particular, are extremely competitive for primary metals manufacturers.
“It’s a combination of both cost and quality criteria,” she explained. “In our methodology, operating cost counts for two-thirds of the score, or the ranking, and then the quality score, which is made up of a function of what kind of industry sector and presence do you already have there? What type of workforce do you have? Regulatory environment, what type of infrastructure do you have? Those are the things that we look at to give a weighted comparative score for these different locations.”
Caldwell said the highest-ranked locations meet two of the most important criteria. They can provide high-quality at a low cost.
She said another benefit is how one manufacturer can open the door for another, similar company because the first company is the catalyst for developing a trained workforce and related suppliers.
“For every job that’s created directly, there are also indirect jobs that are suppliers to that industry, or they could be customers,” she said. “So, if you’ve got an Aurubis there (in Augusta) that’s making copper wire, then there might be downstream customers for that. That moves more into the secondary processing, but it does build a supply chain that you can build upon.”
Mega Metal manufactures copper wire for industries including automotive, medical, aerospace, and defense. The Fairfield County facility will be 91,000 square feet. Once fully operational, it will produce 55 million pounds of superfine electrolytic oxygen-free (EOF) copper wire.
“This investment in Fairfield County is not only a manufacturing milestone, but it is a reflection of our long-term commitment to the North American market. We are proud to grow alongside the state of South Carolina, contribute to the regional economy, and build a foundation of industrial excellence,” the news release quoted Cuneyt Turgut, Board Chairman of Mega Metal.
Caldwell said 2024 was her company’s first primary metals report. She said it was a phenomenon created by manufacturers such as the Novelis aluminum rolling mill in Baldwin County, Ala., and Hyundai’s recently announced steel manufacturing operation in Louisiana.
She cautioned, while the new tariffs will stimulate the restarting of idled metals production facilities and the construction of new ones, it will take time.
“A decision like Mega Metal, which is relatively small in comparison to a lot of these big metals projects, but even one like that, it can easily take a year to figure out what the optimal location for your operation is. Then you’ve still got to go through permitting. You’ve got to go through design, then you start to construct it. So sometimes, from the time you say, ‘I need to build some capacity in the United States, and let’s start looking for a site,’ it could easily be three to five years before you have the first product coming out,” she said.
The report shows that in 2024 alone, capital investments from announced primary metal manufacturing projects were $4.7 billion across 42 projects, totaling 5,400+ jobs across the U.S.
Caldwell said she believes one reason for the revitalization of the primary metals manufacturing in the U.S. is a drop in energy costs.
“They’re under pressure right now because of all the growth that we’ve seen in data centers and mega projects and the electrification of cars and everything else,” she said. “So, relative to many other places around the world, we have very, very competitive energy costs. With our current regulated utilities in Georgia and South Carolina, I would say the good thing is that we have quite a bit of our power that comes from nuclear. The fuel price for nuclear does not change very much at all, not like it does for natural gas and coal.”
Mega Metal expects to be operational in September 2025. Information on open positions will be on the company’s career page.
https://www.megametalinc.com/en/people-and-culture/avaliable-positions
