STEVENAGE, England, February 9, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --

First tenant moves in

Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst (SBC), the UK's first open innovation bioscience campus, is pleased to announce that it is now open for business. In addition, it has welcomed its first tenant, Aptiv Solutions, which has taken space in the Incubator building. SBC expects its first year of operation to be a busy one - discussions with a range of interesting tenants are progressing, and the facility will play host to various conferences and events focused on rejuvenation of the UK biosciences sector.

Focused on early-stage drug discovery and development, Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst forms a unique and collaborative environment for companies large and small. Its offering, from access to stakeholder expertise, high quality equipment, free e-journal use, laboratory, office, virtual and hot desking space, is proving very attractive. Work is underway on further defining the technological areas in which SBC and its collaborators will develop open innovation activities. In addition, in order to start-up, incubate and grow new companies, mechanisms for access to intellectual property and further funding are in development.

For Aptiv Solutions and in particular the Translational and Medical Sciences Consultancy division, the move to Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst provides a unique opportunity to participate in the open innovation ethos of Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst, while benefiting from the state-of-the-art facilities and environment available to tenants.  Aptiv Solutions provides comprehensive drug and medical device development services with an expertise in Adaptive Clinical Trial design, simulation and execution.

Commenting on these exciting developments, Dr Martino Picardo, CEO of Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst said, "Everyone in the Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst team is delighted that we are open for business, and many thanks are due to everyone associated with the delivery of the facility. We are really pleased that our first occupant is a quality company like Aptiv Solutions, and are very encouraged by the discussions we are having with other potential tenants. Our busy year of conferences and events at SBC starts with the Praxis/Unico conference 'Young and Emerging Healthcare Companies - Delivering the Future^[1]' on March 1, and I look forward to seeing many of you there."

Pat Donnelly, CEO and Chairman of Aptiv Solutions stated, "We recognise that innovation is central to the success of drug and medical device development in addressing unmet medical needs. In joining the vision created by SBC to tackle the challenges the biopharmaceutical industry faces by driving new approaches in discovery and development, we offer our congratulations to the founders of SBC in their initiative to create a unique knowledge hub for scientific innovation. We are excited about the possibilities that this facility and the evolving community will generate."

Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst is a joint venture between the Department of Business, Innovation & Skills, GlaxoSmithKline, the Wellcome Trust, the East of England Development Agency and the Technology Strategy Board. The £38m development is an independent bioscience facility.

^[1] Young & Emerging Healthcare Businesses  - Delivering the future, 1 March 2012, GlaxoSmithKline R&D, Medicines Research Centre, Stevenage. http://www.praxisunico.org.uk/

About Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst

Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst is the UK's first open innovation bioscience campus, pioneering a unique culture to drive early stage drug discovery and development. It is backed by £38m of funding from its founding partners - GlaxoSmithKline, the Wellcome Trust, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, the Technology Strategy Board and the East of England Development Agency. Buildings in Phase 1 of the development consist of an Incubator, an Accelerator and a Hub, covering 60,000 sq ft of laboratory, office and networking space. The independent facility is expected to house a range of companies, from virtual and start-up firms to those which are more established. Located on the GlaxoSmithKline Stevenage site, Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst is in the unique position of operating in proximity to the expertise and resources of a major pharmaceutical company, close to both London and Cambridge. For more information, please go to http://www.stevenagecatalyst.com.

About GlaxoSmithKline

GSK aims to improve the quality of human life by enabling people to do more, feel better and live longer. This mission gives us the purpose to develop innovative medicines and products that help millions of people around the world. Every hour we spend more than £300,000 (US$562,000) in our search for new medicines that can make a difference to patients. We are one of the pharmaceutical industry leaders, with an estimated seven per cent of the world's pharmaceutical market and one of the few companies researching both medicines and vaccines for the World Health Organization's three priority diseases - HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. As a company with a firm foundation in science, we have a flair for research and a track record of turning that research into powerful, marketable drugs.

About the Wellcome Trust

The Wellcome Trust is a global charitable foundation dedicated to achieving extraordinary improvements in human and animal health. It supports the brightest minds in biomedical research and the medical humanities. The Trust's breadth of support includes public engagement, education and the application of research to improve health. It is independent of both political and commercial interests. http://www.wellcome.ac.uk

About EEDA

EEDA's mission has been to improve the economy of the East of England through helping businesses prosper, supporting people to be the best they can and breathing new life into places. Working with others we have helped improve the lives of thousands of people with investments that will continue to have an impact for decades to come. EEDA works across the six counties of Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk and Suffolk , and unitary authorities of Central Bedfordshire, Bedford, Luton, Peterborough, Southend-on-Sea and Thurrock. In the Emergency Budget of 22 June 2010, the government confirmed its intention to abolish all regional development agencies (RDAs) and replace them with Local Enterprise Partnerships. EEDA will close by March 2012. Visit http://www.eeda.org.uk to find out more.

About the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) is building a dynamic and competitive UK economy by: creating the conditions for business success; promoting innovation, enterprise and science; and giving everyone the skills and opportunities to succeed. To achieve this it will foster world-class universities and promote an open global economy. BIS - Investing in our future.

About the Technology Strategy Board

The Technology Strategy Board works to drive economic growth by making the UK a global leader in innovation. Established by the government, the Technology Strategy Board helps business to innovate faster and more effectively than would otherwise be possible. It uses its expertise, connections and funding to enable collaborations and partnerships between businesses, researchers and government, and to help business to create innovative products and services which will meet market needs, tackle the challenges of our time and build the economy of tomorrow.

About Aptiv Solutions

Aptiv Solutions is a global biopharmaceutical and medical device development services company focused on recognizing, understanding and enabling clients to capitalize on rapid and fundamental changes facing companies developing products in the pharmaceutical, biotech and medical device market. Our Translational and Medical Sciences consultancy provides product development strategy and support from project inception through to proof-of-concept and beyond.

We have the strategic planning, project management, preclinical efficacy and safety, CMC, and early clinical experience and expertise required to guide clients along the optimal drug, biologic, or device development path into early phase trials and regulatory submission. The company offers clients an extensive portfolio of innovative services including adaptive clinical trials, translational research services, regulatory services, pharmacovigilance, clinical staffing and the operational support of a global clinical research organization. Aptiv Solutions has over 850 professionals in North America, Europe, the Middle East, Japan, and Australia. Visit the website at http://www.aptivsolutions.com .

For further information or to meet Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst in 2012 please contact:

Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst
Martino Picardo, CEO                            
+44(0)1438-768551

Emma Palmer Foster, Strategic Communications Consultant  
+44(0)7880-787185
comms@stevenagecatalyst.com

Aptiv Solutions
Gillian DellaCioppa, Director of Marketing                  
+1-508-597-6000
inquiry@aptivsolutions.com

SOURCE Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst