In July, the government allocated £520M towards the UK’s life sciences sector development and outlined its goal to lead Europe in the sector by 2030, and rank third globally behind the U.S. and China by 2035.
To reach this goal requires real estate that can follow the sector's product progression, Gardiner & Theobald partner Trevor Springham said. New investments need to consider how products progress from clinical trials to pilot plants, and ultimately into commercial manufacturing, where a good manufacturing practice-compliant facility becomes essential.
Developing each type of facility brings both opportunities and risks, particularly as the life sciences sector as a whole is evolving, he said.
“The pace of change brought by AI and robotics, as well as regulatory changes, makes it a challenging landscape to navigate,” he said. “Developers need to factor the sector’s evolution into planning at the early stages, bringing in the right engineers who have learned from experience.”
Bisnow spoke to Springham as well as Gardiner & Theobald partner Richard Lee-Cunningham and associate director Dan Levett about what investors, designers and end users need to know before embarking on a new or refurbishment life sciences scheme.
Focus On Power, Gasses And Infrastructure
The first consideration is that a development needs much greater access to power than other real estate, as well as to supplies of specialist gasses, Levett said. Labs typically need three to 10 times the power of an academic or office building, depending on whether it's GMP or containment level 2 space .
This makes it hard to develop a life sciences facility speculatively, Lee-Cunningham said. Not only is it costly, but building a high-performance facility that is not required by a tenant creates a lot of waste.
“There’s a push and pull of developers trying to create something ready for occupiers to walk in, but they’re dealing with life sciences businesses that have very different requirements, often bespoke and technically demanding,” he said. “They need to create a blend of estimated clients.”
Having worked closely with occupiers, Lee-Cunningham said that he suggests developers create buildings that aren’t already weighed down by predesigned facilities that might or might not suit clients. This raises the opportunity to create something bespoke for them that is life sciences-enabled, he said.
Gardiner & Theobald works with both developers and occupiers and has developed guidance and project leadership based on experience, Lee-Cunningham said.
“Our developer work is informed by our occupier teams and benefits from lessons learned whilst working with tenants who find problems X, Y, Z when they turn up at completed developments,” he said. “It becomes a circle of improvement that teams who work only with developers or tenants don’t benefit from.”
Developers should also future-proof assets to accommodate the needs of future tenants, Springham said. He gave the examples of ensuring air tightness and cleanliness of areas to allow for validation at a later date, increasing storey heights to allow for plant and including large enough risers to accommodate larger air ducts.
“It’s about building that flexibility into the early stages of design,” he said. “You need to put adequate time into planning and documenting each phase properly to make sure the building will get through a later validation process. This includes establishing GMP standards and requirements at the onset.”
Keep The Future In Mind
As well as allowing for future tenants, developers need to keep in mind the rapid pace of change in the life sciences sector, Levett said. AI and the growth of automation and robotics are evolving working methods rapidly which is impacting the potential for speculative labs.
“The challenge is that specifications change quickly,” he said. “If computers can rule out 90% of potential molecules leaving you to test 10%, that will need less space. What developers specified three years ago, perhaps 60% wet lab and 40% office, is not really what’s needed now.”
Even when designing for a specific tenant for a GMP manufacturing facility, for example, it pays to engage with the research and development department to understand their product pipeline, Levett said.
Large pharmaceutical companies will start to consider a new manufacturing facility when they’re still in R&D, but many products are not commercially viable, he said. A developer needs to be aware of the likelihood of products coming to market and what storage and logistics facilities could be needed.
Proximity To Affordable Housing
In Q2 2025, the golden triangle of London, Oxford and Cambridge saw life sciences take up of 168,300SF, an 80% increase on Q1. Five schemes reached completion while a further 3.8M SF of lab space was under construction.
However, housing is a challenge. Rents have risen in the golden triangle by 30% in the past three years and the supply of private rented accommodation has declined.
Developers might do well to consider opportunities outside of this cluster, Springham said. Gardiner & Theobald is working on a scheme in Stevenage which is more affordable while still located close to other life sciences hubs, as well as schemes in other cities close to universities.
“Some clients are stepping away from the traditional life sciences areas such as Oxford and Cambridge towards areas with a better cost of living,” he said. “There are other universities that have strong life sciences and robotics departments such as Bristol, Manchester or Edinburgh.”
The Growth Of Incubator Space
Establishing partnerships with such universities will require life sciences space that caters for each specific research specialism, Levett said.
The government has identified 30 UK-wide specialist clusters, most linked to universities. These include the Department of Materials at Manchester University, the digital cluster linked to the University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre and BioYorkshire, which partners with the University of York.
While some investors might be drawn to provide a “rent a bench” incubator model to support the growth of university spin-out companies, this is operationally risky due to the cost and nature of supplying specialist equipment and services, Levett said. However, it will support the growth of the UK’s life sciences industry by providing spin-outs with access to expensive equipment that is critical in some areas of research.
“Investors are drawn to the incubator model because it’s higher risk, higher reward and we’re likely to see growth in this space,” he said. “Startups can begin in a small space with shared lab facilities and grow through the building as they develop.”
The ESG Challenge
Energy consumption and wider environmental impact are undoubtedly a challenge for life sciences facilities. Due to the nature of the work carried out inside, they are extremely consumptive of power and water and it is difficult to achieve environmental accreditation for buildings, Levett said.
However, life sciences buildings are not comparable to an office in regard to embodied and operational carbon due to the work undertaken inside, Lee-Cunningham said.
“At the moment, the gap is stark between planning targets of power consumption and the life sciences sector metrics for actual use,” he said. “But when understanding the environmental impact of facilities, we also need to consider the massive social benefit research can have on society."
It is still possible to install low carbon solutions that any other real estate might include, such as insulation and measures to reduce solar gain, Springham said.
“We can be smart in design and monitor the energy efficiency of buildings so from day one we can look at continuous improvement,” he said. “As the use of AI grows, this will increase.”
Levett said that an area of ESG that can be improved on is in how facilities meet the needs of workers. Gardiner & Theobald worked on Harwell Science and Innovation Campus, which has been recognised for its approach to designing for neurodiversity.
“One thing that has been overlooked in the past is not just the design of labs, but of the amenities and placemaking around them,” he said. “The industry is moving towards an understanding of how to create spaces that work well not only for production, but for the people within.”
This article was produced in collaboration between Gardiner & Theobald and Bisnow.
