| One of the city’s own biotech successes, Cypex, is to occupy a 5000 square feet, single-storey building at the Medipark, relocating from rented premises at the nearby Dundee Technology Park.
The company, first established in 1999, specialises in the development and manufacture of high-quality in vitro drug metabolism systems that can reduce both the development cost and the late stage failure of new drugs.
The new HQ at the Medipark will give the company four times more space than it currently occupies. The move to the new home is scheduled for April.
Cypex has seven employees, two of whom were recruited earlier this year in anticipation of the relocation.
Attracting the first occupant for the Medipark has been a long time coming and has followed extensive marketing exercises both at home and abroad.
Scottish Enterprise Tayside and what was then Dundee Teaching Hospitals first joined forces in 1997 to invest over £1 million opening the 20-acre Medipark site, immediately to the west of Ninewells Hospital.
At that time it was said the aim was to have 200,000 square feet of laboratory space accommodating up to 600 people involved in a variety of medical and scientific businesses.
But, despite the close proximity to the huge Ninewells teaching hospital complex and Dundee’s strong reputation as a leading European life sciences location, finding occupants for the site has taken considerably longer than many people either hoped or expected.
Indeed, two 11,000 square feet buildings, both built speculatively and each at a cost of around of £1 million, have been standing empty at the site for many months.
It is understood, however, there is interest in both buildings.
Cypex’s new building is to cost in the region of £580,000 – with SET contributing about £130,000 to the project. |
