Richmond, VA

Greater Richmond Gets Busy with Biotech

Call it the New East Coast Center for Biosciences. As life sciences activity has increased over the past 12 years, the Greater Richmond Region has been smack dab in the middle of the growth. A biotechnology village is maturing around Greater Richmond’s local research university and its cluster of life sciences companies continues to grow.

“Our most recent addition to the area is Philip Morris USA with its $350 million Center for Research and Technology in downtown Richmond,” said Greg Wingfield, president and CEO of the Greater Richmond Partnership. “The Center will allow Philip Morris to develop new technologies to improve existing products and may lead to innovative new products.”

Greater Richmond is home to industry leading production and research operations, including Wyeth, Boehringer Ingelheim, Wako Chemicals, E.I. DuPont, Honeywell, NewMarket, Commonwealth Biotechnologies, PPD, and dozens of other early- to mid-stage biotech companies. In fact, the biosciences cluster now employs more than 3,500 in Greater Richmond and more than 8,400 in the I-64 Corridor.

The Virginia BioTechnology Research Park, which opened in December 1995, is two-thirds developed. Located on a 34-acre campus adjacent to the Virginia Commonwealth 2niversity (VCU) Medical Center, the Park is home to a unique mix of biosciences companies and research institutes. These entities are affiliated with the VCU Medical Center and major state and national medical laboratories involved with forensics, testing of biotoxins, and management of the nation’s organ transplantation process.

The Research Park’s tenants are housed in nine buildings, filling more than 1.2 million square feet and employing more than 2,000 scientists, researchers, engineers and technicians. Partnerships with neighboring Henrico and Chesterfield counties extend the reach of the Park to satellite parks that can accommodate larger companies on suburban campuses in the Greater Richmond area.

The VCU Medical Center, the fourth-largest university-affiliated teaching hospital in the nation, is also a boon for the region. With a fiscal year 2007 research budget of $227.2 million, 75 percent of which focuses on the life sciences, VCU ranks among the nation’s top 100 research universities. The proximity of the Medical Center’s hospitals, clinics and health sciences schools to the BioTech Park and the local industry provides just the right synergistic environment for faculty to pursue collaboration with industry.

This clustering of life science activity, coupled with Greater Richmond’s moderate cost of living and high quality of life makes the area a magnet for continued industry growth and development. The Greater Richmond Partnership, Inc. is the economic development organization that provides site location assistance to companies expanding or relocating operations. The Partnership represents Chesterfield, Hanover, and Henrico counties and the City of Richmond, Va. Working closely with the Virginia Biotechnology Research Park and VCU, the Partnership has assisted biomedical companies including Wyeth and Boehringer Ingelheim and is prepared to assist many more in the years to come.

For more information about the Greater Richmond Region, call the Greater Richmond Partnership at 800-229-6332, send e-mail to ghw@grvpa.com or visit www.grpva.com.