New Labs in China and the UK
This fall’s edition of IBO’s biannual article highlighting selected new laboratory construction and openings focuses on academic and industrial investments. The table on page 4 lists new projects in the automobile industry and at medical schools. New labs in China, the UK, Europe and the US are also highlighted.
China
Several companies have recently announced new labs in China serving the food, chemical and pharmaceutical industries. Mars announced last month that it will build a food-safety center in Huairou, outside Beijing, according to China Daily. The $15 million facility will be used for research, collaborations and training. In July, General Mills opened its first China-based innovation center in Shanghai. The $15 million, 75,000 sq2 facility houses R&D for food-safety, food-nutrition research and food sensory-evaluation centers, which will develop foods for the Chinese market. Nestlé inaugurated a new R&D operation for confectioneries and ice cream in Dongguan, Guangdong, in June, according to China Daily. It is the company’s third R&D facility in China and is designed to support its collaboration with Chinese food firm Hsu Fu Chi, in which Nestlé holds a stake. The company plans to open a fourth Chinese R&D facility in Xiamen, Fujian.
This summer, three chemical companies announced investments in China. BASF initiated construction of the second phase of its Innovation Campus Asia Pacific in Shanghai’s Pudong district. The €90 million ($122 million = €0.74 =$1) project includes an R&D building and will be completed at the end of next year. Also in Pudong, FMC opened its Asia Innovation Center in July. One-hundred-eighty employees occupy the nine-story, 22,000 m2 building, 60% of which is occupied by research labs. The facility consolidates four previous sites. Also in July, Air Liquide began construction of its €28 million ($34 million), 12,000 ft2 Shanghai Research & Technology Center in the Minhang district of Shanghai. Two hundred employees will work at the Center, which will focus on several areas including energy-efficiency technology and water treatment.
To serve the pharmaceutical industry, SGS Life Science Services announced in July the expansion of its Shanghai-based cGMP chemistry and microbiology labs. The 1,500 m2 labs will be increased to 2,000 m2 as part of a plan to provide new services, such as cytotoxicity testing, cell-based assays and packaging testing. The expansion will add a dissolution lab, a mycoplasma lab and a highly active compound–testing lab. The project will be completed in the second quarter of 2015. Another contract-testing company, WuXi PharmaTech, announced in May that SynTheAll Pharmaceutical, a manufacturing subsidiary, began operating a high-potency API lab in Shanghai for process development and clinical trial support. In May, Baxter opened a CNY 350 million ($57 million = CNY 6.17 = $1), nearly 10,000 m2 R&D facility in Suzhou. It houses 130 employees involved in formula development, chemical analysis, production and packaging, according to the Suzhou Industrial Park web site.
UK
New lab projects have also been announced in the UK. The University of Liverpool and Unilever announced in June plans for the £65 million ($110 million = £0.59 =$1), 120,000 ft2 Materials Innovation Factory (MIF) focused on the company’s Home Care and Personal Care products. Materials-chemistry research will be conducted by 250 researchers. Construction began this month, and the facility will open by summer 2016. Another consumer-products firm has also decided to make R&D investments in the UK. RB, a consumer-health and -hygiene firm, announced in July that its £100 million ($169 million) investment in the country will include a Centre of Scientific Excellence for health R&D at its site in Hull. Construction will begin early next year with the Centre expected to be in operation in early 2018.
US Academic
In the US, several universities have launched large-scale laboratory projects. In May, Vanderbilt University in Tennessee broke ground on its $109 million, seven-story 230,000 ft2 Science and Engineering Building. The Building will contain research labs on five floors. It is scheduled to open in summer 2016. Another university in the southern US, the University of Georgia, broke ground in August on the 122,500 ft2 Science Learning Center. The $44.7 million building will contain 33 teaching labs and is scheduled to open in fall 2016.
In the Northeast US, two new academic labs are planned. Rutgers University in New Jersey announced in June the construction of a new facility for its Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology. The four-story, 145,000 ft2 building will hold a microscopy suite, clean room and labs for optical spectroscopy, NMR and x-ray crystallography. The facility will open in fall 2016. Also investing in new chemistry labs is the University of Rhode Island, which began construction in June of the Center for Chemical and Forensic Sciences. The five-story, 135,000 ft2 building will house eight teaching labs for general chemistry, five teaching labs for organic chemistry, an advanced lab for chemical teaching and an instrumentation lab, as well as 18 research labs for faculty. The US Department of Homeland Security’s Center for Excellence for Explosives Detection, Mitigation and Response will also be located in the building. Construction is expected to be completed in spring 2016.