Dendreon could soon be headed from Belltown to downtown.
The Seattle-based biotech company (NASDAQ: [[ticker:DNDN]]), currently based in an aging lab building at 3005 First Avenue near Denny Way, appears to on its way into the 42-story Russell Investments Center, according to a Seattle Times story by commercial real estate reporter Eric Pryne. An architecture firm filed plans with the city to modify floors 36 through 38 for Dendreon. The Times also quoted unnamed sources saying the company might take as many as eight floors.
Dendreon spokeswoman Tricia Larson told the newspaper it is “exploring all options, and this is one.” No final decision has been made, she said.
The company has been growing like gangbusters since April 2009, when it showed in a pivotal clinical trial of 512 men with prostate cancer that its novel immune-booster was able to prolong lives with minimal side effects. The drug won FDA approval last April. Over the last month, Dendreon has raised an additional $600 million to maximize the sales potential of this product, sipuleucel-T (Provenge), around the world. The company has been hiring hundreds of employees with new capabilities in areas like marketing and manufacturing—not just here in Seattle, but also at other sites in New Jersey, Georgia, and southern California.
The Russell Center, formerly known as the WaMu Center, isn’t set up to accommodate labs, so those will have to go somewhere else, the Times said.
Back in early May, Dendreon said it had signed a letter of intent to expand into a new lab and office building along Elliott Bay developed by Martin Selig, but the lease still hasn’t been signed, the Times said. Selig declined to comment to the newspaper.
If Dendreon moves into the Russell Investments Center, I’ll be sure to try (on a clear day, anyway) to whip out the camera for a new photo of CEO Mitch Gold with the Olympic mountains in the background. You can already see them from his current office perch, but, no doubt, this new place offers a whole new view, higher up in the world.
