Biotechnology

The University of Houston will complete the $76-million Science and Engineering Research and Classroom Complex in spring of 2006. Designed by Cesar Pelli, the facility will enable collaboration between researchers from the Cullen College of Engineering and the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. The complex will accommodate research in biotechnology, nano-lithography, DNA chips, protein chips, materials, optoelectronics, synthetic medicinal chemistry, and drug design.

St. Louis-based Sigma Aldrich Corp. will construct an $8-million laboratory-scale production facility in Hyderabad, India. Expected to be operational by the first quarter of 2005, the 50,000-sf complex will eventually house up to 80 chemists doing contract research and process development for the pharmaceutical industry.

Genentech has expanded with the lease of 141,348 sf of office space in an 11-story, 249,732-sf building in Boston Properties’ Gateway Commons in South San Francisco.  

North Carolina Sate University is planning a 91,000-sf biomanufacturing test facility that will simulate a good-manufacturing-practices environment at its Raleigh campus. The $36-million facility, funded by a Golden Leaf grant, will provide workforce training for the biomanufacturing industry.

Genentech Corp. will locate 130 information technology employees in a 65,000-sf building recently purchased in Redwood City, Calif. The facility is located in the Mid-Point Technology Park, a site previously occupied by ExciteAtHome.

Cell Signaling Technology, based in Beverly, Mass., will renovate the 125-room Kings Grant Inn in Danvers, Mass., as its new headquarters facility. Cell Signaling is a biotechnology company that develops antibodies for cancer research.

United Therapeutics will construct a 40,000-sf ovarian cancer research lab and pharmaceutical manufacturing building adjacent to its headquarters in Silver Spring, Md. The $15-million lab is part of a 190,000-sf biotechnology campus planned by United Therapeutics. The new facility will manufacture OvaRex, an alternative to chemotherapy, in bulk for shipping to third-party manufacturers that will form it into pills.

Neurocrine Biosciences is developing the first phase of a 13.4-acre project in San Diego's Carmel Valley. Designed by Dowler Grumman Architects, the 200,000-sf, two-building project is being constructed by Ledcor Petty Construction.