Demand pushes Oxford lab rents towards new record
Take-up across the Oxford life sciences market has accelerated during the first quarter of 2023, pushing rents towards new highs, according to Savills.
Prices for fully fitted laboratories have hit a record £75 per sq ft across the key Oxford clusters as competition tightens for the remaining life sciences-related workspace.
Savills’ data shows all available fitted laboratories in Oxford are currently either let or under offer, with no additional space being delivered until summer 2023.
Take-up across the Oxford life sciences market has accelerated during the first quarter of 2023, pushing rents towards new highs, according to Savills.
Prices for fully fitted laboratories have hit a record £75 per sq ft across the key Oxford clusters as competition tightens for the remaining life sciences-related workspace.
Savills’ data shows all available fitted laboratories in Oxford are currently either let or under offer, with no additional space being delivered until summer 2023.
Beyond that, upon completion, schemes on Oxford Science Park, Abingdon Science Park and along Botley Road should provide an additional 160,000 sq ft of purpose-built space to the market.
Leasing deals signed for life sciences-related space totalled 260,000 sq ft in the three months to the end of March, 89% of which was for laboratory and research and development facilities, according to Savills.
Take-up in the first quarter of 2023 represents more than 50% of 2022’s total of around 500,000 sq ft. In Q1 2022, take-up was 166,000 sq ft.
The figures were boosted by biotech firm Moderna signing for a 145,000 sq ft innovation and technology centre at Harwell Campus.
Other transactions saw Williams Advanced Engineering moving into 57,000 sq ft of research and development space at Oxford Technology Park, MiroBio taking 11,000 sq ft of fitted lab and office space at ARC Oxford and Brill Power set to convert 8,000 sq ft of offices to dry labs in Oxford city centre.
Jan Losch, associate director at Savills, said: “Overall, we are still seeing a significant number of requirements for everything from shell and core to fully fitted and cat A labs, which will no doubt translate into further take-up as new development is completed and the construction of additional speculative schemes are announced across the city.”
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