Alexandria Signs Biotech Tenant For Massive Watertown Campus
A pharmaceutical firm that recently received fast-track Food and Drug Administration authorization for an oral Covid-19 treatment has signed a new lease to expand into a 73K SF lab-and-office space at Alexandria Real Estate Equities' Arsenal on the Charles megacampus in Watertown, Massachusetts.
Enanta Pharmaceuticals signed a lease to occupy space in a to-be-constructed, 128K SF building at the 1.1M SF redevelopment of the former Athenahealth campus just outside Boston, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. The firm expects to occupy the space in 2024 and pays roughly $92 per SF, with a 3% annual increase, according to a copy of the new lease.
The deal includes a $15M tenant improvement allowance and an option to extend the lease for five years on the same terms. As part of the agreement, Enanta would vacate its nearly 49K SF space at 500 Arsenal St. when the new building is ready. It also leases space at 400 Talcott Ave., which it expanded by 20K SF and extended to terminate with the new deal in 2034.
During a recent quarterly earnings call, Alexandria Chairman Joel Marcus commented on the uncertainty in the larger biotech market and argued that the REIT’s long-term relationships with clients like Enanta, and the REIT's ability to offer them different dimensions and types of space as they grow and expand, is one of its strengths.
Focused on developing small molecule drugs for viral infections and liver disease, Enanta has raised a total of $84.6M over eight funding rounds, according to Crunchbase.
Enanta is just the latest Boston-area life sciences company to agree to an expansion in a building two years or more from completion. In the last four months, Vertex Pharmaceuticals leased a 344K SF build-to-suit lab and office building in the Seaport with Related Beal; AstraZeneca inked a 570K SF build-to-suit deal in Kendall Square with Boston Properties; and Eli Lilly signed with Alexandria to build a $700M, 334K SF RNA research facility in the Seaport.
