Capital Cost Estimator – Industrial Process and Pharmaceutical Equipment

At Lilly, the work is demanding because patients are waiting. We unite caring with discovery to help make life better for people around the world, knowing that every decision, every detail, and every day matters. Headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana, our over 50,000 employees around the globe take on complex challenges to discover and deliver life-changing medicines, strengthen how health is understood and managed, and support the communities we serve.

This is hard, urgent, selfless work—but it’s work worth doing. If you’re driven by purpose and ready to bring your best to work that truly matters for patients, we invite you to join us. The Global Facilities Delivery (GFD) Organization, part of Corporate Engineering, delivers new and renovated capital assets around the world. Our mission is accomplished through a highly leveraged organization of design, construction and qualification contractors.

Many of the assets delivered focus on manufacturing medical innovations and delivering innovative solutions to patients. Some of the assets delivered support an expansion in supply of existing medicines.

The Industrial Process Capital Cost Estimator develops owner-side Class 5 through Class 1 estimates for major pharmaceutical process equipment, packaged systems, process piping, hygienic systems, process utilities, equipment installation, and related construction scopes. The role converts evolving process and engineering scope, equipment data, vendor information, execution strategies, market data, and benchmarks into complete, traceable, and decision-ready estimates. The role will assess equipment freight, rigging, setting, modularization, fabrication, specialty welding, testing, passivation, validation support, spare parts, and vendor field services.

• Develop capital cost estimates from Class 5 through Class 1 using methods appropriate to the maturity of project definition, including capacity-factored, parametric, assembly-level, unit-rate, and detailed quantity takeoff methods.
• Prepare estimate plans, estimate workbooks, quantity takeoffs, pricing build-ups, bases of estimate, assumptions, exclusions, qualifications, and supporting documentation for assigned scopes.
• Interpret business requirements, basis-of-design information, drawings, specifications, equipment lists, process flow diagrams, P&IDs, layouts, schedules, contracting strategies, and construction execution plans to define estimate scope and cost.
• Build labor, material, equipment, subcontract, construction management, temporary facilities, logistics, indirect cost, escalation, and contingency inputs appropriate to the assigned discipline and estimate class.
• Obtain and normalize vendor budget quotes, contractor pricing, market rates, productivity factors, location factors, escalation inputs, and historical cost data.
• Identify scope gaps, overlaps, ambiguities, estimate risks, cost drivers, and missing inputs; document their treatment in the estimate and Basis of Estimate.
• Perform cost benchmarking using historical project data, comparable facilities, market intelligence, and normalized unit-cost metrics to validate estimate reasonableness, identify cost drivers, and explain variances. Develop and maintain internal benchmarking databases using actual costs from completed and active projects and maintain current insights into relevant external benchmarks.
• Complete estimate reconciliation, variance analysis, and estimate-to-estimate bridging as scope and design mature.
• Support multidisciplinary estimate reviews and page-turns with project teams, engineering partners, construction partners, procurement, and project controls.
• Prepare estimate summaries and clear cost narratives…