Foghorn Therapeutics broke ground in January of 2020 on its 60,000-sf headquarters in Cambridge, Mass. Located in Kendall Square, the facility will provide chemistry and biology labs, open offices, conference rooms, huddle rooms, and an employee café. Foghorn will occupy over three floors in the building, which is owned by Alexandria Real Estate Equities and managed by CBRE.
The National Institutes of Health is planning to build a dementia research center in Bethesda, Md. The 24,000-sf facility will provide labs, open collaboration spaces, conference rooms, and offices to support the discovery of new diagnostic tools and treatments for Alzheimer's disease and related conditions. The single-story structure will be delivered in less than two years using modular construction technologies. The cost of the project has yet to be determined, with estimates ranging from $25 to $100 million.
St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital is constructing the $13.4 million Shared Resource Center in Memphis, Tenn. Accommodating 60 employees, the project will provide core laboratories and instrumentation suites to accelerate the discovery of new treatments for pediatric cancer and other diseases. Created inside an existing 300,000-sf warehouse, the 100,000-sf center will house:
Amgen has leased a 240,000-sf research facility located on the Gateway of Pacific campus in South San Francisco, Calif. Amgen will occupy the entire north tower, which is being constructed by BioMed Realty as part of the second phase of development at the site. Featuring modular wet and molecular labs designed for optimal energy efficiency, the facility will accommodate Amgen's research programs in oncology, inflammation, and cardiometabolic diseases.
The new 100,000-sf AstraZeneca site in South San Francisco, located in the Cove at Oyster Point complex, is the company’s first facility where open offices and labs are seamlessly integrated with each other to promote increased mobility and interaction among the researchers. Housing around 400 employees, the building brings together staff from AstraZeneca’s Technology Innovation & Delivery Excellence (TIDE) unit, as well as subsidiaries MedImmune, Acerta Pharma, and Pearl Therapeutics into one state-of-the-art facility at the center of the Bay Area’s vibrant biotech and technology sector.
HALIX opened a 72,000-sf biopharmaceutical development and manufacturing center in November of 2019 at Leiden Bio Science Park in the Netherlands. The five-story structure provides BSL-2 cleanrooms with unidirectional process flows that can easily be upgraded to BSL-3 as needed. A manufacturing line with a 250-liter bioreactor capacity supports the production of viral vaccines and viral vectors, while a separate protein manufacturing area accommodates single-use bioreactors with a capacity of up to 1,000 liters.
The University of Hawaii at Hilo dedicated the $31 million Daniel K. Inouye College of Pharmacy in December of 2019. Designed by SmithGroup and WCIT Architecture, the 45,000-sf facility offers technology-rich environments for applied learning including collaborative classrooms, teaching labs, seminar rooms, and a simulated pharmacy. The three-story structure includes research labs for pharmaceutical discovery as well as a medication therapy management suite, consultation rooms, and a resource center.
Thermo Fisher Scientific opened a $90 million viral vector facility in December of 2019 in Lexington, Mass. Featuring specialized GMP laboratories, the 50,000-sf project will accommodate the development, testing, and manufacture of viral vectors for the creation of gene and cell therapies. The center will act as a CDMO (contract development and manufacturing organization) site and will offer services including from drug development through clinical trials and commercial production.
The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley broke ground in November of 2019 on the $30 million Institute for Neuroscience in Harlingen. Designed by Muñoz & Co. Architects, the 32,570-sf translational research facility will provide integrated laboratory, diagnostic, and clinical spaces where doctors and scientists can collaboratively develop innovative therapies for neuropsychiatric disorders.
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory opened the Center for Therapeutic Research in late October of 2019 in Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y. Designed by Centerbrook Architects and Planners, the $75 million project involved the renovation and expansion of the existing Demerec Laboratory to create a 26,000-sf biomedical facility for the creation of advanced therapies for genetic diseases including cancer, diabetes, obesity, and autism.
WuXi Biologics is planning to expand its pharmaceutical manufacturing campus in Dundalk, Ireland. A three-story, 110,600-sf vaccine production plant will leverage single-use technologies and processes to optimize efficiency and scalability. A four-story, 62,000-sf facility housing laboratories and administrative offices will also be constructed. The project represents the second phase of development at the site, where WuXi is currently building a $365 million, 522,000-sf manufacturing center that will begin commercial operation in 2022.
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) is joining a growing wave of pharmaceutical research facilities that are incorporating small-scale manufacturing into their spaces. Fitting the manufacturing suites into an underground floor of an existing building was a challenge for architect, engineer, and scientist alike. The suites are designed to produce clinical vectors, important “vehicles” to which drug companies “attach” treatments so that those treatments reach the right location in a patient’s body.
Great Ormond Street Hospital opened the £42 million Zayed Centre for Research into Rare Disease in Children in October of 2019 in London. Developed in partnership with University College London, the 140,000-sf translational research facility collocates biomedical laboratories, GMP manufacturing suites, clinical spaces, and offices to enable the creation of innovative medical devices and personalized gene and cell therapies.
Janssen Sciences Ireland, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, began constructing a $355 million, 206,000-sf pharmaceutical manufacturing facility in October of 2017 in Ringaskiddy. Existing facilities accommodating administration, logistics, and warehousing will also be expanded. Completion is expected in late 2019.
Seattle Children’s Research Institute opened the $300 million Building Cure in October of 2019. The 540,000-sf translational research facility provides advanced laboratories for the development of innovative treatments for pediatric cancer, sickle cell anemia, ADHD, and diabetes. One entire floor of the building houses the Cure Factory, a GMP cell-therapy manufacturing center for the creation of personalized medicine solutions.
