A biotech incubator at the University of California (UC), Berkeley is getting a boost, launching a dedicated space for expanding companies that have outgrown their starter homes. The incubator, Bakar Labs, is teaming up with UC Berkeley’s Innovative Genomics Institute (IGI) to build a new, six-story facility with 72,000 square feet of space.
The IGI-Bakar Labs building is slated to finish construction in 2028 and to house up to 14 biotech companies, the incubator said in a July 21 release. It’s intended to give companies enough space to stay in Berkeley once they hire more than 20 or 30 employees.
“It’s important to keep startups in Berkeley because they’re not just creating jobs for skilled graduates, they’re feeding a cycle of innovation,” David Schaffer, Ph.D., a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at UC Berkeley and director of Bakar Labs, said in the release. “When leaders stay connected to the ecosystem, they return to Bakar Labs as mentors, advisors and role models. That continuity strengthens the entire community.”
The first three floors of the IGI-Bakar Labs building will be office space for IGI, a genome engineering nonprofit that was founded by UC Berkeley professor and Nobel Laureate Jennifer Doudna, Ph.D. Doudna herself has two startups housed at Bakar Labs, according to the release: Azalea Therapeutics and CatenaBio.
Floors four to six will be for Bakar Labs, along with a rooftop conference space that overlooks the university campus.
“Bakar Labs gave us the foundation to move fast and stay focused during our earliest days,” Sophia Lugo, CEO and co-founder of Radar Therapeutics, said in the release. “This new expansion space is exactly what companies like ours need to keep building, without leaving behind the ecosystem that helped us get here.”
Bakar Labs is run by QB3, an institute that focuses on quantitative biosciences and spans UC campuses in Berkeley, San Francisco and Santa Cruz. Schaffer is also director of QB3 and has himself spun out several companies from his lab, including 4D Molecular Therapeutics, Ignite Immunotherapies (acquired by Pfizer) and Rewrite (acquired by Intellia).
One of Bakar Lab’s newest tenants is Renasant Bio, which launched July 10 with $54.5 million and a plan to develop next-gen oral meds for kidney disease.
The Bakar Labs team-up is the second collaboration IGI has announced this month. After playing a role in the historic custom CRISPR treatment of an infant born with a rare disease, IGI linked up with the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative to form the Center for Pediatric CRISPR Cures. The center brings together UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco to craft custom cures for babies born with rare diseases.