January 17, 2017
By Alex Keown, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
SAN FRANCISCO – Merck & Co. ended 2016 hitting key milestones towards expanding its U.S. footprint in biomedical research, including inking a deal for the company’s future west coast discovery research center in South San Francisco.
In November, Merck signed on with Alexandria Real Estate Equities to build its new west coast research facility in the 200 block of East Grand Avenue in the heart of the Bay Area. Construction is expected to begin on the new site early this year and be ready for use by 2019.
The Bay Area is one of the most innovative hubs for the pharma and biotech industries and Merck wanted to secure a large presence in the area, particularly since the Bay Area will provide access to multiple funding sources and collaborative opportunities with biotech startups.
The new facility will feature nine stories and 290,000 square feet of research and office space close to downtown South San Francisco and a new Cal train station. Research will span exploratory research through early development, with an initial focus on cardiovascular, metabolic and renal diseases.
According to early architectural plans, the Merck facility will feature open green space to promote health and wellness for employees as well as function as an outdoor event space. The site is also expected to include a 300-seat auditorium, a fully equipped fitness center and a “lively café and terrace with waterfront views designed to enhance innovation, productivity and collaboration.”
While Merck awaits the opening of its new site, the company is already hard at work on the west coast conducting cardiovascular, metabolic and renal disease research at an interim facility, also in South San Francisco. It is recruiting approximately 100 employees to begin working at the interim site so that research teams are established by the time the new research facility is open.
“As our research teams grow, we will pursue the most promising science, regardless of therapeutic area,” Mathai Mammen, Merck’s senior vice president of oncology, immunology, cardiovascular and metabolic disease research, told BioSpace.
Merck currently maintains a research facility in nearby Palo Alto that employs about 100 scientists and staff. Those employees will be transitioned into the new South San Francisco facility upon completion, the company said.
The new facility will include an open atmosphere concept that the company hopes will energize research and promote greater collaboration between team members, regardless of research area or discipline.
“The intention of this approach is to promote interactions and fuel an atmosphere of collaboration to solve ‘drug discovery’ research problems,” Joe Miletich, senior vice president of discovery, preclinical and early development at Merck Research Laboratories , told BioSpace. “In discovery research, we are constantly looking for a greater diversity of new insights and approaches that will lead us to a deeper understanding of human disease biology so that we can continually improve our ability to discover high impact medicines and vaccines.”
The facility will include glass walls to separate the lab and office space, wherever possible, to minimize the distinction between spaces,” Miletich said.
“Building in South San Francisco provides a premier location in the heart of a major biomedical hotbed with a high density of emerging biomedical research. The chosen site also has the benefit of close proximity to Merck’s San Francisco Business Development and Licensing team. The two teams work closely to identify and pursue potential collaborations with local academic and biopharma entities,” Miletich said.
Across the country, in the other thriving biotech hub of Cambridge/Boston, Merck has opened an Exploratory Science Center in Kendall Square, co-located with Merck’s Business Development and Licensing team, where initial research is focusing on the microbiome and understanding host-pathogen interactions.
“The goal of our new discovery sites, in Cambridge and South San Francisco, is to bring new expertise and capabilities to Merck that complement our existing R&D strengths, and to more fully integrate within these important biomedical ecosystems to encourage increased external collaboration,” Miletich said.
