Biotech Firm Dissolves, Terminates 85K SF Cambridge Lease With Alexandria
Rubius Therapeutics, a life sciences company that went public at a $2B valuation in 2018, has now dissolved and liquidated assets including its headquarters in Cambridge and its manufacturing facility in Rhode Island.
The firm terminated its 85K SF headquarters lease with Alexandria Real Estate Equities at 399 Binney St. in Kendall Square, according to documents filed Monday with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The company initially announced it would dissolve and liquidate in an SEC filing Wednesday, and then it revealed more details about the liquidation of its real estate holdings in Monday's filing.
The company entered into an agreement with Alexandria on Dec. 12 to terminate the lease effective Jan. 31, it said in the filing. Under the agreement, Rubius paid a lease termination payment of $7M to Alexandria.
Rubius signed the lease in 2018, at the time only signing for 45K SF before later expanding its footprint as the company grew and hired more people.
The lease termination comes after the company sold its 135K SF clinical manufacturing facility in Smithfield, Rhode Island, to The Davis Cos. for $18.5M on Dec. 21. The company had laid off 70 of its 101 employees at the site prior to the sale.
The life sciences company went public in 2018 at a $2B valuation and saw steady growth in its share price into 2021. But Rubius then began to lag, halting trials and cutting 75% of its staff by 2022, BioPharma Dive reported.
On Wednesday, the company's board of directors unanimously approved to dissolve the company and liquidate all of its remaining assets. The company's market value was $15M at the time of the approval.
The company was one of many biotech firms across Boston that faced severe challenges last year, with publicly traded companies seeing their share prices tank and startups struggling to raise money. One industry expert told the Boston Globe in January the biotech industry was "holding on by its fingernails."
