JLL announced it recently completed a lease for 185,000 square feet of space at the 433-acre Bristol-Myers Squibb Hopewell campus with PTC Therapeutics. The global biopharmaceutical firm is the first anchor tenant to sign at the 433-acre Princeton West R&D community.

Located at 311 Pennington-Rocky Hill Road in Hopewell, the property includes an existing state-of-the-art biologics production facility, and supporting research and operations buildings. PTC Therapeutics’ long-term lease will occupy Buildings 9, 10, 12, 13 and a portion of Building 18 at the Princeton West campus.

PTC plans to further develop the biologics facility to support gene therapy production, and foster innovation and employment in the community. In addition, the firm plans to move its research operations to a newly renovated building on the same campus. These facilities will complement and enhance existing operations at PTC Therapeutics’ global headquarters in South Plainfield.

Building owner Bristol-Myers Squibb was represented by Daniel Loughlin, vice chairman and head of office brokerage in New Jersey; Joseph Garibaldi and James Medenbach, managing directors; and John Buckley and Robert Ryan, senior vice presidents. They worked closely with a multi-disciplinary team from Bristol-Myers Squibb. PTC Therapeutics was represented by Charles Parmelli, director, with Cushman & Wakefield. Christopher Costa, shareholder, and Christopher Tarr, partner, with law firm Stevens & Lee PC represented BMS; Robert Klausner and Mat Carlson, partners, with law firm Fox Rothschild LLP representing PTC Therapeutics.

“JLL New Jersey has extensive experience in marketing high-value life science sites,” said Loughlin. “Bristol-Myers Squibb’s Hopewell campus is a state-of-the-art, move-in ready research, innovation and manufacturing space that is located in a region with a highly skilled workforce. Repositioning a corporate campus to accommodate multiple users is challenging and complex. JLL appreciates the vision and efforts of all the other project stakeholders that enabled this unique property to facilitate PTC Therapeutics’ exciting growth and future in New Jersey.”

Additional space for lease includes 500,000 square feet of research and development space, a portion of which contains two recently renovated state-of-the-art biology R&D modules.

The property also has a 106,000-square-foot global data center and 330,000 square feet of office space for lease. The campus is supported by a central utility complex, including an N-4 wastewater treatment plant that can facilitate future development. The site is expandable by 1.8 million square feet, with local zoning recently changed to allow for the production and assembly uses related to the fields of medicine, pharmacology and biologics.