The Wall Street Journal and other sources are reporting that Deerfield Management Company, in partnership with the Economic Development Corporation (EDC) and the Industrial Development Agency, is creating a transformative $635 million life science campus in NoMad over on Park Avenue South between 25th and 26th Streets.  This is good news for our area, because it will continue to make our neighborhood a magnet for creativity, technology and improved infrastructure.

One of the key reasons NoMad was chosen for this center was its robust transit connections and ease of access.  The campuses proximity to mass transit will be transformative in attracting the city’s top talent according to James Flynn, Deerfield’s managing partner, who commented that location is a common hurdle: “A lot of the sites that are zoned for labs are really hard to get to. One of the things New York needs is talent. It’s got great academic discoveries, but it doesn’t, like Boston, have all the executive talent you need to incubate these companies. Some of the locations that are hard to get to, it’s also hard to attract talent there.”

Deerfield purchased a 12-story structure at 345 Park Avenue for $345 million and is spending another $290 million to renovate the structure.  By early 2021, the 300,000 square foot expanse will be move in ready with laboratory space, research offices, over 200,000 square feet of wet labs, and other cutting edge amenities.

New York’s EDC President and CEO James Patchett sees the NoMad campus as being a perfect solution: “The shortage of commercial laboratory, engineering and computing space has prevented us from developing cures for some of the most pressing medical conditions here in New York and nationally, but with LifeSci NYC we are changing that quickly.”

The building will serve every type of specialist in the healthcare industry.  Scientists, entrepreneurs, and innovators will now be able to develop cures and protocols for the management of deadly and debilitating ailments. Patchett also observed, “New York City already has the best research institutions in the world. By investing in this Life Sciences campus to bring new lab space and programming for healthcare and early-stage biotech companies, we can strengthen the City’s position as a global leader in life sciences.”

Now instead of licensing innovative procedures and products to outside companies, local institutions, such as Columbia, Cornell, Rockefeller, and Memorial Sloan Kettering, will be able to incubate these products and procedures into standalone businesses, as institutions in other cities already do.  This means greater local worth, job creation, and enhanced national and international reputations for local institutions.

The life science campus being created here is part of a 10-year, $500 million effort to establish New York as a top-tier biopharma hub with 16,000 new life-science jobs and up to three million square feet of new space for life-sci companies and institutions.  The announcement of the new campus comes on the heels of another life sciences project Deerfield Management has been involved with in New York. In June, Deerfield teamed up with Columbia University to form a research and development alliance called Hudson Heights Innovations that will be backed by an initial investment of $130 million from Deerfield.

To encourage these developments, the city has provided $92 million in tax incentives over a 20 year time-frame—a sizeable investment that speaks to the city’s overwhelming support towards New York’s broader mission of creating a number of high paying jobs and diversifying the economy in the biotech sector.  It has been reported by biospace.com that the new campus on Park Avenue South is expected to provide 1,400 jobs.

It’s great to see our vibrant neighborhood become even more diverse while reaffirming the two features of NoMad that make it so vital to the life of New York City—creative and technological energy.