Startups on agenda at new Biotech Place

The next big biotech success story for the Triad may be nothing more than a fluid in a professor’s test tube right now. Coaxing a company to life from such a humble beginning is a key part of the business plan of the expanding Piedmont Triad Research Park.

That’s why within the sprawling 242,000-square-foot Wake Forest Biotech Place building, recently renovated by Wexford Science + Technology at a cost of $100 million, is about 15,000 square feet set aside as low-cost space for startups and young companies that could grow into major park tenants.

Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, chief sponsor of the PTRP, is the biggest tenant of that building, and Dan Cramer, Wexford’s executive vice president overseeing Biotech Place, said attracting mature corporate users is also an important part of its plan.

“But the incubation of small startups and entrepreneurs — people that might spring off from the university or just want to be near the energy of others like them — is a big piece of it, too,” Cramer said. Read more