Industry News

BD Medical Pharmaceutical Systems , a maker of medical technology products, will broke ground on a $33.5-million addition to its Columbus, Ohio, manufacturing plant October 13, 2005. The project is comprised of a 15,000-sf sterilization addition to the existing 230,000-sf facility and equipment to increase manufacturing and production capacity for glass drug containers. One-third of the new production capacity will be functional in one year. The sterilization facility is slated for completion in two years.

Genzyme Corp. broke ground on a 177,000-sf research facility in Framingham, Mass., on October 5, 2005. The $124-million project consists of a six-story research building and a separate utilities facility that will provide services to it and three other Genzyme buildings in Framingham. The research facility will feature a six-story atrium with offices and labs designed to promote collaboration and interaction.

Cisco Systems is developing the 37,000-sf Education and Development Center in Research Triangle Park, N.C. Located in Cisco's Building 11, the employee training center will cost between $1 million and $2 million to construct. Featuring classrooms, video rooms, laboratory space, and lounges, the facility will train approximately 2,000 Cisco employees annually.

Construction of two new laboratories and a central energy plant upgrade for Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution is nearing completion on its Quisset Campus in Woods Hole, Mass. One laboratory, the 32,000-sf marine research facility, was constructed primarily for researchers to study marine mammals and their environment. The second new building is a 35,000-sf biogeochemistry laboratory to study organic materials in the marine environment. The two laboratories increase the Institution's scientific research space by more than 20 percent.

Brookhaven National Laboratory celebrated the groundbreaking of the 94,500-sf Center for Functional Nanomaterials (CFN) in Upton, N.Y., in October of 2005. Designed by HDR Architecture of Alexandria, Va., and constructed by E.W. Howell Co. of Woodbury, N.Y., the $81-million CFN is one of five Nanoscale Science Research Centers to be constructed at Department of Energy national laboratories. The construction cost of the facility is $38 million.