Pharmaceutical firm Astellas has committed $12.5m to become the founding sponsor of a biotech incubator that will be launched by US-based laboratory space provider and startup hub LabCentral.
The new hub, dubbed LabCentral 238, will be located in Cambridge, Massachusetts and will also be supported by a $5m grant from public-private economic development and investment agency Massachusetts Life Sciences Center.
LabCentral 238 will open in 2021 with capacity for about 20 startups and will incorporate core lab space to facilitate process development studies as well as testing equipment. Astellas has also agreed to invest at least $450,000 in LabCentral’s existing hub, LabCentral 610, over a three-year period.
Japan-headquartered Astellas already has a strong operational presence in the Greater Boston area, which is an epicentre for biotech research due to the existence of several local universities including Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
MIT is also the real estate partner for LabCentral 610, whose founding sponsors were environmental services provider Triumvirate Environmental and Johnson & Johnson Innovation – JJDC, the corporate venturing arm of medical products group Johnson & Johnson.
Astellas claims it has pumped more than $800m into the Massachusetts ecosystem since 2010 through acquisitions of biotech developers and the planned construction of a facility for its stem cell-focused research division, Astellas Institute for Regenerative Medicine.
Johan Fruehauf, co-founder and president of LabCentral, added: “Since our launch in 2013, LabCentral has been a very successful example of a public-private partnership that created an economic and scientific engine driving the biotech industry and economy in Massachusetts.”