SAN JOSE — A tech and biotech incubator hub in San Jose is gaining traction and tenants, a fledgling complex that may offer a hopeful counterpoint to a grim landscape for the office market in the Bay Area.
BioCube is attracting biotech, life science and tech companies to its new incubator hub in north San Jose. Business is brisk enough that the executives behind the complex have begun to build out the second phase of the site.
“We are creating workplaces so companies can start at BioCube and then grow in place right here,” said Tony Gonzalez. BioCube chief executive officer. “This is a complete ecosystem for startups that are growing.”
The company operates BioCube San Jose North at 2680 Zanker Road, an office and research building with multiple lab spaces that totals 70,000 square feet. The organization also operates BioCube San Jose South on Optical Court in the southern part of the city.
The first phase of the north San Jose building totals 35,000 square feet and is about 35% leased to an array of companies.
The companies that are occupants in both the northern and southern BioCube incubator hubs are typically early-stage biotech, pharmaceutical and biopharma companies, as well as clean tech, greentech and battery technology firms.
The labs are paired with office suites, flexible meeting spaces, advanced kinds of break rooms, and modern outdoor areas.
BioCube San Jose North was designed to be flexible enough to accommodate companies that need small spaces to conduct cutting-edge research, along with spaces to handle the same companies, or other firms, that are larger and in a growth spurt.
“Recently, we have seen a lot more activity” from companies seeking to occupy spaces in BioCube San Jose North, said Peter Conte, a national director for life sciences with Transwestern, a commercial real estate firm. Conte added, “We’re getting a lot more traction.”
BioCube is preparing the unoccupied 35,000-square-foot portion of the building to enable startups that might eventually seek expansion space.
“Our activity is going better than the general office market,” Conte said.
The BioCube developers know the Bay Area office market is taking on water as it navigates through a storm surge of empty spaces, slumping building values, a wave of foreclosures and sinking rents.
“We are all experiencing the same economic downturn,” Gonzalez said. “We are not immune to it.”
Gonzalez hopes that the BioCube hub in north San Jose can experience the same level of success as the BioCube San Jose South site at 941 Optical Court.
That south San Jose incubator, which totals 67,000 square feet, is about 95% leased.
“BioCube has already incubated more than 100 (startups and ventures) and currently serves a diverse portfolio of companies advancing research and development in pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, medical devices, biomedical technologies, genomics, cleantech, and food tech,” according to information released by BioCube.
BioCube eschews the conventional leasing arrangements that stretch from five to 10 years, or even longer. Instead, the company offers month-to-month leases with 90 days’ notice that a tenant will exit the space.
This is the flexibility that is needed in a post-coronavirus world characterized by an uneven and incomplete return to the office, in the view of Gonzalez.
“Companies at BioCube can all grow in place,” Gonzalez says of the BioCube San Jose North incubator. “We can accommodate up to 70 companies here.”