The effort to build a COVID-19 vaccine is continuing to generate new demand for daily life sciences place in Montgomery County, with one of the foremost vaccine developers taking in excess of a former industrial building and land previously planned for combined-use progress.
Courtesy of Rock Creek Property Group
The lifetime sciences building at 700 Quince Orchard Street.
Novavax, a biotech corporation that has been given $2B in funding for its COVID-19 get the job done, introduced Monday it signed a 122K SF lease at 700 Quince Orchard Road in Gaithersburg.
The enterprise signed a 15-yr lease and designs to occupy the place early future calendar year, working with it for workplaces, production, and investigation and development. Novavax also announced it obtained a 9.7-acre piece of land at 14 Firstfield Highway in Gaithersburg for long run development.
The Quince Orchard Road project shipped in August from Rock Creek Residence Team, which adapted it from a manufacturing creating that was vacated five yrs back by DRS Technologies.
As aspect of the deal, Rock Creek marketed the building for $43M to Alexandria Actual Estate Equities, which is in flip leasing it to Novavax, Rock Creek principal Gary Schlager told Bisnow.
Cushman & Wakefield’s Kevin McGloon, Peter Rosan and Megan Williams represented Rock Creek in the deal. JLL’s Pete Briskman, Joe Judge and Matt Jackson represented Novavax.
The building’s 1st floor is indoor parking. Novavax designs to change it to manufacturing and lab room, allowing it to broaden to 170K SF, Schlager reported. Rock Creek began its conversion previous calendar year on spec and shipped it in August.
“When the coronavirus strike the earth and these pharma companies started out to function on vaccines, that developed elevated demand from customers for existence sciences house on the market place,” Schlager mentioned. “We were in the ideal place at the appropriate time and had been in a position to in a position to accommodate Novavax in its developing prerequisites.”
Rock Creek was also the vendor of the 9.7-acre parcel, which traded for $14.5M, Schlager mentioned. The developer experienced previously planned to build a mixed-use project on the web site with 175 townhouses.
“We labored for years to create a combined-use undertaking there which would be live-do the job-enjoy, but we pivoted mainly because of the new demand in the current market from the existence sciences local community, precisely in this situation operating on the coronavirus,” Schlager stated.
The Office of Health and fitness and Human Products and services introduced in July it arrived at a $1.6B deal with Novavax to manufacture a COVID-19 vaccine. The business also obtained $388M from the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations.
Novavax has a Section 3 COVID-19 vaccine trial underway in the U.K. and is arranging to start out Stage 3 trials in the United States and Mexico this thirty day period. It has various Stage 2 trials in the performs all around the globe. The firm also explained it is producing a world network for producing and quick distribution, a stage that could prove to be critical in the timing of the vaccine rollout.
“The growth of our physical footprint demonstrates Novavax’ substantial expansion as we do the job to each rapidly supply a COVID-19 vaccine and progress NanoFlu, our influenza vaccine candidate, for regulatory submission and prospective commercialization,” Novavax CEO Stanley Erck mentioned in a release.
An October 2018 photograph of Scheer Partners’ office environment-to-lab conversion task at 704 Quince Orchard Street in Gaithersburg.
In August, Novavax signed a lease in an 80K SF building at 704 Quince Orchard Road, next door to the latest assets it leased. That setting up was an office environment-to-lab conversion task from Scheer Companions and Alexandria Serious Estate Equities.
Novavax is headquartered in a close by Gaithersburg developing at 21 Firstfield Road. The corporation now employs over 140 individuals in Montgomery County, and it fully commited to including at minimum 400 new community positions by December 2024, with a majority of them coming in the next 4 months.
The deal arrived with many incentives for Novavax. The Maryland Section of Commerce approved a $2M financial loan contingent on position generation and a $200K grant. Montgomery County approved a $500K grant, also contingent on position creation, and Gaithersburg is expected to approve a $50K grant.
“Novavax has been on the forefront in the battle in opposition to COVID-19, and we are happy to assist this expansion and the new work opportunities that it will carry,” Gov. Larry Hogan explained in a launch. “The do the job that Novavax is carrying out, ideal in this article in Maryland, will effects millions all-around the planet as we carry on on the road to restoration from this world-wide pandemic.”