Content area
Full Text
SOUTH SIDE-A South Side landlord is making a bid for one of his properties to become a Pittsburgh Life Sciences Greenhouse incubator.
Ron Tarquinio, owner of the River Park Commons office building on Sidney Street, said he will be submitting a proposal touting his building's amenities, which include a 16,000-square-foot cleanroom.
The Greenhouse issued a request May 3 for companies to create and manage a bioscience incubator facility.
The Greenhouse, a nonprofit economic development organization formed to grow the biotech industry in the Pittsburgh area, is seeking a facility or facilities to house very early-stage firms, offering them specialized amenities including legal, accounting and business consulting services.
Built 54 years ago, 220,000-square-foot River Park Commons had been a Gimbels warehouse, and later a UPMC medical warehouse until 1998 when Mr. Tarquinio renovated it as a technology office park.
Current tenants include Seagate Technologies, Akustica Inc., Xactix Inc., Verimetrix Inc., pair Networks Inc. and MAIN Medical Inc.
"There's already a synergy here," he said.
Mr. Tarquinio said Butler County-based Oberg Medical Products Co. is one of those interested in the building.
"There are a number of developers who will work to try to get that contract," Mr. Tarquinio said. "We have a neat space and by putting these companies together they can utilize the assets here."
...