AstraZeneca’s £1bn new research and development centre houses 16 labs and 2,200 scientists, making it the biggest science lab in Britain along with the Francis Crick Institute in London, and the pharmaceutical company’s biggest single site investment to date.
Designed by the Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron, the Discovery Centre covers an area the size of eight football pitches, and is part of Europe’s biggest biomedical cluster. Cambridge University, two hospitals and hundreds of research institutions and biotech firms are nearby.
“The unveiling of AstraZeneca’s extraordinary Discovery Centre at the heart of the Cambridge Biomedical Campus confirms the importance of our region – and of the whole Oxford-Cambridge Arc – in driving scientific innovation, developing new treatments and fostering a vibrant life sciences ecosystem that continues to attract investment and deliver economic growth.”
Prof Andy Neely, University of Cambridge
Cambridge and Oxford already contain the largest density of Life Sciences R&D in the UK today. Here in the Arc, we are building on extremely fertile ground. Oxford and Cambridge are ranked in the top 5 institutions for life sciences and medicine globally, and ahead of cities such as London, Tokyo and Bejing, are in the top 10 science cities in the world. The region has vast untapped potential, already with an economic output of £100bn per year. AstraZeneca’s commitment to Cambridge and the Oxford-Cambridge Arc is an opportunity for the region to build our capabilities for UK competitiveness in Life Sciences for the future.
