We're Helping To Create a Biotechnology Incubator in Roanoke

We’re working in a public-private partnership to develop biotechnology incubator labs in downtown Roanoke. The labs will help us continue our region’s transformation into a sophisticated health care and life sciences center.

We join the City of Roanoke, Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC, the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center, Verge and Virginia Western Community College in the collaboration. Roanoke is administering $15.7 million dollars in Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development funds for the project, which was approved by the 2022 General Assembly.

The funds will create 40,000 square feet of shared biotech lab space in our Jefferson Plaza building at 1030 South Jefferson St. in the Roanoke Innovation Corridor. The building’s sleep lab and diabetes nutrition program will move to new offices.

A view of the Innovation Corridor in Roanoke

The first-of-its-kind project in the region will allow Carilion Clinic Innovation to work even more closely with our physicians and care teams, furthering the work of those who have unique health care improvement ideas.

“The shared lab space will attract existing and start-up businesses in the life sciences, biotechnology and health care sectors,” said president and CEO Nancy Howell Agee. “But the space is one small step. Most importantly, the building will be an innovative gathering place for our region’s greatest minds to collaborate with those who have promising new ideas about exciting and challenging projects.”

The incubator labs are the next step to providing a foundation for biotech companies to turn inventions and processes into commercial businesses. The project is an outgrowth of a GO Virginia-driven economic development project that identified needs for lab space, access to biotech experts and mentoring opportunities.

GO Virginia funds paid for the new Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center biotech lab space that is being developed in Blacksburg. The Roanoke and Blacksburg labs will allow our researchers and others to collaborate with health sciences companies including Johnson and Johnson Innovation and its virtual residency program, JLABS.

The Roanoke-based biotech labs are expected to open in late 2024. They’ll expand our health system’s position as a regional and national destination for world-class, pioneering doctors, nurses, therapists and scientists whose innovative ideas can move closer to helping our patients and communities.  

For more information, contact Pete Larkin, Marketing and Communications, at pslarkin@carilionclinic.org.