Dive Brief:
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Johnson & Johnson Innovation, together with New York State and the New York Genome Center, will launch a new JLABS site in the Big Apple, the company said Monday.
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The facility is slated to open in 2018, and is the latest collaborative incubator launched by the juggernaut drugmaker. Expanding the JLABS model has been a priority for Johnson & Johnson, with locations already in place in San Diego, San Francisco, South San Francisco, Boston, Houston, Toronto and Lowell, MA.
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New York state is providing $17 million worth of funding for the new 30,000-square-foot facility, which could hold up to 30 pharmaceutical, medical device and healthcare startups, according to a Jan. 9 statement.
Dive Insight:
To date, the JLABS platform has served as an incubator for more than 200 companies and currently houses more than 140 life sciences businesses. In all, 33 collaborations have formed between companies at JLABS and Johnson & Johnson, the company said.
As with other JLAB facilities, the NYC location offers lab and office space, equipment to conduct research, and access to financial and industry experts, all under a “no-strings attached" model.
Johnson & Johnson is far from alone in its efforts. Incubators aimed at shaping early drug development and innovation are sprouting up across the U.S., as big pharma and private partners find new ways to team with academia. They also offer emerging biotechs a way around handling high real estate costs, scarce lab space and finding access to capital.
Among numerous recent examples, Amgen's Swiss subsidiary invested in an Israel-based digital health incubator in October.
“Expanding the JLABS model to New York City, home to world-class academic and medical institutions, furthers Johnson & Johnson Innovation’s commitment to providing resources that catalyze and foster the growth of life science ecosystems around the world,” Johnson & Johnson's Chief Scientific Officer Paul Stoffels said in the statement.
The new lab could also help the city reach its own goals. In December, Mayor Bill de Blasio introduced a $500 million initiative, called LifeSci NYC, to create 16,000 new life science jobs and to promote his city as a research and innovation hub.