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Bond Sale to Give Technology Park Boost

Posted on: Wednesday, 22 February 2006, 09:00 CST

By Jon Van, Chicago Tribune

Feb. 22--A $40 million upgrade to the Chicago Technology Park on the city's Near West Side will be financed by the sale of bonds backed by the Illinois Finance Authority.

The money will be used to buy two parcels of land and build a new facility to house companies once they grow enough to leave the current incubator space at the tech park, said Sam Pruett, executive director of the Illinois Medical District Commission, operator of the facility, which runs west from Ashland Avenue to Oakley Boulevard and north from 15th Street to Congress Parkway.

Several start-up companies are on a waiting list to use tech park space, and some will move into an existing building on some of the land being purchased by the medical district.

"There's a scarcity of wet lab space," Pruett said Tuesday, referring to facilities that have running water, a necessity for companies in the life sciences.

State policy is to encourage development of the life science industry in Illinois, Gov. Rod Blagojevich said in a statement announcing the $40 million project.

Last year, the old G.D. Searle & Co. campus in Skokie began a transformation into the Illinois Science + Technology Park, a 28-acre facility available to life sciences companies that will be operated by Forest City Enterprises Inc., a Cleveland-based private developer.

Michael D. Rosen, a local biotech consultant who works with Forest City, said that some companies are negotiating to rent space in Skokie. Some events may be held at the park in conjunction with BIO 2006, the industry trade show that will come to Chicago for the first time this April.

Pruett said the Skokie facilities are more attractive to larger life science firms that have grown beyond the early-stage development typical of companies that would use the space available at the West Side tech park.

The Illinois Institute of Technology is also building a new technology park on the city's South Side, and a technology incubation facility is located in Evanston, close to Northwestern University.

jvan@tribune.com

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Copyright (c) 2006, Chicago Tribune

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Source: Chicago Tribune

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