FibroGen deal a boost for Mission Bay
Bernadette Tansey, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
San Francisco has landed its largest biotechnology company to date, a boost to the city”s campaign to become a center of biotech research and some welcome momentum for the slow-starting Mission Bay project. FibroGen Inc. of South San Francisco, which is developing drugs for anemia, pain related to diabetes and other conditions, has agreed to move its operations to Mission Bay, according to the company and city officials. The city has long sought to establish an enclave of biotechnology companies clustered around UCSF”s new campus at Mission Bay but has had only small success so far. An official announcement of FibroGen”s move is expected today. The company”s relocation represents the largest real estate deal so far for a single biotech company at Mission Bay.
Privately held FibroGen has signed a 15-year lease with Shorenstein Properties LLC to occupy a 239,000-square-foot building under construction a block from the UCSF campus, with rights to expand into an adjacent 211,000-square-foot building. Terms were not disclosed. The company”s relocation to 409 Illinois St., planned for late 2008, is the kind of move city boosters expected to come quickly as UCSF constructed its sprawling life sciences complex on former industrial tracts east of Highway 280. Biotech companies usually concentrate around academic centers where they have access to top scientific talent.
When Willie Brown was mayor in 2002, he tried to woo FibroGen and other companies with tours of available properties and promises to facilitate permit approvals. But the city found it hard to lure many companies away from such established biotech clusters as South San Francisco, where Genentech Inc. is based. San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom successfully pushed for a city payroll tax break for biotech firms in 2005, which helped attract two companies. FivePrime Therapeutics Inc. leases a floor in the six-story J. David Gladstone Institutes building on Owens Street. Sirna Therapeutics Inc. leased 5,000 square feet at the China Basin Landing complex at 185 Berry St.
FibroGen”s arrival is expected to bolster the nascent Mission Bay biotech cluster and bring at least 200 jobs to the city. The company employs about 190 people, but it expects to expand its staff to 300 to 400 people by the time it moves into its Mission Bay digs. “We believe that Mission Bay can meet FibroGen”s need for increasing scale while providing us a unique opportunity to expand access to leading clinical experts and academic researchers in a variety of medical specialties,”" Chief Executive Officer Thomas Neff said.
In April, FibroGen announced a licensing deal worth as much as $815 million with a Tokyo company to co-develop two compounds that could eventually compete with anemia drugs sold by such industry heavyweights as Amgen and Roche. Phill Gross, managing director of Adage Capital Management in Boston, said his firm was one of the investors in a $100 million equity financing of FibroGen in early 2005 because FibroGen has the potential to improve the treatment of anemia. Currently, patients receive injections of erythropoietin. But FibroGen”s drug candidates, if proven effective, would be taken by mouth.
E-mail Bernadette Tansey at btansey@sfchronicle.com.
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Mark Choey is Senior Sales Associate, Top Producer and principal of Climb Real Estate Group | Vanguard Properties. Mark specializes primarily in condo and loft sales in SOMA, South Beach, Rincon Hill, and Mission Bay.
Specializing in large buildings and especially new developments like The Infinity where he is the top agent in total sales, Mark has a passion for city living. Mark is the creator of www.SFnewdevelopments.com to help buyers and sellers navigate the dynamic new development condo housing market.
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