Pivotal Manufacturing Partners Acquires 140 Acres at Phipps Bend in Northeast Tennessee, Plans Development of The Phipps Bend Advanced Manufacturing & Technology Campus Anchored by Highland Materials

NEW YORK & JOHNSON CITY, Tenn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Pivotal Manufacturing Partners (“Pivotal”), a real estate investment platform focused on advanced manufacturing and energy infrastructure, announced today the acquisition of approximately 140 acres of land at the former planned Phipps Bend Nuclear Plant in Hawkins County, Tennessee. In tandem, Pivotal executed a long-term ground lease with Highland Materials (“Highland”), a next-generation polysilicon manufacturer, who plans to develop a world-class, $1 billion+ advanced manufacturing facility on a portion of the site.

The broader property—the Phipps Bend Advanced Manufacturing & Technology Campus—is planned as a high-power, heavy infrastructure destination designed to support mission critical operators requiring scale, high-power infrastructure, flexible zoning, and streamlined execution. The campus offers direct on-site access to a major TVA-owned regional transmission interconnect, the primary regional power distribution hub for Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia, and benefits from a nuclear-industrial historical overlay and development-friendly permitting environment.

“We are honored to be investing behind the growth of Northeast Tennessee at such a unique site at Phipps Bend. This campus combines striking mission critical infrastructure, a rare high-voltage interconnect, and a permitting environment shaped by its nuclear legacy – all within a region eager to welcome transformational capital investment,” said David Robbins, Managing Partner of Pivotal Manufacturing Partners. “We are proud to be partnering with Highland Materials to advance their planned facility and look forward to continuing to work with all of our local partners as Phipps Bend emerges as a premier destination for this next generation high-power industrial renaissance.”

Originally developed by the TVA in the late 1970s as a nuclear power facility, the Phipps Bend site saw over $2.6 billion in federal investment before the project was canceled in the early 1980s prior to completion after the Three Mile Island incident. While no reactors were ever brought online, the site retains a powerful legacy: significant utility infrastructure, a strategic location within the TVA transmission network, and a regional development mindset rooted in energy-intensive industry. Today, those attributes provide a differentiated foundation for advanced manufacturing and critical technology operations.

Highland Materials is a U.S.-based manufacturer of high-purity polysilicon, a critical material used in both the solar and semiconductor supply chains. The company is developing a next-generation production platform designed to meet rising domestic and international demand for such critical technologies. Highland selected Phipps Bend for its exceptional power infrastructure, strategic location within the TVA region, and development-ready environment capable of supporting large-scale, high-precision manufacturing.

“Partnering with Pivotal Manufacturing Partners is a critical step needed to move the Highland polysilicon manufacturing facility forward at Phipps Bend” said Richard Rast, CEO of Highland Materials. “We are excited about the market opportunity, the job creation, the capital investment, and the continued community and state level support this project enjoys.”

Pivotal and Highland are working closely with local, regional, and federal stakeholders—including Hawkins County, the Tennessee Valley Authority, Holston Electric Cooperative, and the State of Tennessee—to deliver infrastructure, incentives, and economic development to support both near-term and long-term phases of the campus.

About Pivotal Manufacturing Partners

Pivotal Manufacturing Partners (“Pivotal”) is a real estate investment platform built to support the rapidly growing reshoring trend in U.S. advanced manufacturing and critical technologies. The firm’s focus is to invest directly at the intersection of power and real estate - acquiring, developing, and managing large-scale industrial properties with the advanced infrastructure needed to support power-intensive manufacturing processes. The Pivotal platform combines an institutional approach with a long-term oriented view to act decisively, generate compelling risk adjusted returns for their partners, and critically focus on investing in assets poised to benefit from long-term megatrends in reshoring, technological innovation, the scarcity value of power, and the next generation industrial renaissance.

About Highland Materials

Highland Materials is a manufacturer of purified polysilicon and aluminum/silicon alloys. Supported by a world class management team. Highland Materials is positioned to be a major U.S. supplier of ultra-pure polysilicon, to the PV market, the battery silicon anode markets, as well as other industries. The Company has a unique, patent protected silicon purification technology that enables Highland to produce high purity material with 50% reduction in capital cost, a 40% reduction in operating costs, less than half the electric power, and a 90% reduction in carbon emissions compared to other major manufacturers.