Perfect Day Signs 60K-SF Lease at The Gateway in Salt Lake City

Biotechnology company Perfect Day has signed a 60,000-square-foot lease at the Gateway in Downtown Salt Lake City. The lease marks the second US location for the company. The expansion is supported by the Utah Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity and an EDTIF tax credit.

Perfect Day will begin construction on its new space immediately. At this location, the company will expand the Enterprise Biology business unit, which the firm acquired in 2020, delivering scale-up production, IP licensing, strain services, and other offerings to a diverse range of biotechnology, biopharmaceutical and life science customers. According to TM Narayan, Perfect Day’s chief of business operations, the new location will “allowing us to accelerate our impact and business reach with the addition of new infrastructure, resources, and connection to the vitality of the biotech talent growing in the Salt Lake City community.”

The Gateway is a life science hub in Salt Lake City with more than 200,000 square feet of space currently leased to life science tenants. While the life science sector has exploded in the last few years, expanding out from the three core life science cities of San Francisco, Boston and San Diego, Salt Lake City has only recently received attention from life science users. Research from Newmark called the city a standout among non-traditional life science markets that relies on education and research institutions to develop life science ecosystems. Dallas, Miami, Pittsburgh and Atlanta also made the list.

Nationally, investment volume in life science capital markets is achieving new records. Last year, investment in first-half 2021 numbers hitting north of $9 billion and aided by Blackstone’s recent $3.45 billion acquisition of Brookfield’s Cambridge portfolio. Investors are looking to diversify and adjust portfolio risk in the wake of COVID-19. Nationally, pricing remains above average, and June numbers show that pricing surpassed $500 per square foot.

The activity has also increased new construction starts. The current construction pipeline for life sciences lab space sits at 17.1 million square feet, or 10.7% of current inventory, according to data from Cushman & Wakefield. Boston has the largest labor pool and inventory there is set to grow the most of all markets Cushman tracks, with over 9.6 million square feet of lab space currently under construction, followed by San Francisco Bay Area with 2.9 million square feet and San Diego 2.3 million square feet.