Pharmaceutical-Biotech Industry Maintains Balance With $2 Billion in Planned September Project Starts

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Reported by Annette Kreuger, Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--The million dollar question continues to be "... is the economy better, is it getting worse, or is somewhere in between?" Theories abound, talking heads offer wildly varied opinions, while in regard to active capital investment, the facts can only found in hard data. If holding steady is considered a positive thing, a recent survey of Industrial Info's Pharmaceutical Tracker - Online Database has revealed solid good news in terms of project activity for the month of September.

The sector is holding its own with slightly more than $2 billion in 47 expected project starts this month, almost dead even with the September 2009 figure of $2.4 billion. While a serious upward spike in spending would be at the top of everyone's wish list, there is no arguing that maintaining level expenditure is preferable to a freefall. While the industry continues to reinvent itself, the majority of spending will continue to be delivered courtesy of the public sector. The actual value and number of projects beginning this month will only be finalized upon analysis after the fact, because as is always the case, stuff happens.

Click image on image at right for a listing of September 2010 project starts in the North American Pharma-Biotech Industry.

The projects themselves are a good reflection of the industry as whole and where its capital dollars are going: research, research and some production. The largest project is the ambitious Infrastructure Ontario (Toronto, Ontario), a $464 million plan to build a massive forensic services and coroner's complex. A unique agreement with a joint venture under Carillion-Canada will not only serve as the design-build firm for the 550,000-square-foot LEED gold-certified facility, but also will maintain it once operational and will help finance the project. Once complete in 2012, it will serve as home to the Ontario Office of the Chief Coroner and the Centre of Forensic Sciences.

Next up is the kickoff of the $158 million first-phase School of Medicine building for Virginia Commonwealth University (Richmond, Virginia). Designed by Pei Cobb Freed & Partners Architects LLP (New York, New York), the 12-story, 200,000-square-foot building will provide physician training with clinical simulation and research space. Gilbane Building Construction (Richmond, Virginia) is serving as construction manager for the project, which is expected to be completed in March 2013.

While the majority of the month's projects are sourced out of the public sector, the private marketplace is making a showing as well. AIT Laboratories (Indianapolis, Indiana) is investing $74 million for a new 90,000-square-foot toxicology-testing laboratory facility and headquarters in Indianapolis. Located on Innovation Boulevard, construction should take approximately 24 months, with Keystone Architecture (Lafayette, Indiana) and the Paul Kite Company (Indianapolis, Indiana) on board as the project team.

North Carolina received a thrill of the industry's golden days with Medicago Incorporated's (Quebec City, Quebec) decision to build a $42 million vaccine manufacturing plant in Research Triangle Park. To support the company's contract with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), an agency of the Department of Defense, the 90,000-square-foot cGMP plant will utilize Medicago's proprietary plant-based virus-like particle process and purification technology to produce up to 100 million doses per year of vaccines for influenza and other conditions. Alexandria Real Estate Investment Equities Incorporated (NYSE:ARE) (Pasadena, California) is building the project and will lease it to Medicago. The project team includes the BE+K Building Group (Durham, North Carolina) and Clark Nexsen Architects (Norfolk, Virginia).

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