New Jersey remains hot life sciences hub despite macroeconomic, funding headwinds
Pharmaceutical and life science companies accounted for nearly 30% of New Jersey leases signed in the second quarter of 2025, the highest volume of activity among different business sectors, according to commercial real estate and investment management firm JLL. In Q2 2025, life sciences companies inked three of the five largest leases.
“The fact that life sciences companies accounted for nearly 30% of all leasing activity in New Jersey last quarter speaks volumes about the sector’s resilience and long-term commitment to the region,” Jason Benson, senior managing director at JLL, told Pharma Manufacturing.
Benson, who leads JLL’s New Jersey Life Science and Biotech practice, said “this is particularly evident in landmark transactions like Haleon’s headquarters move to Berkeley Heights and Acadia Pharmaceuticals’ expansion in Princeton, each signaling strategic growth and confidence in New Jersey’s infrastructure and workforce.”
When it comes to Q2 real estate sales, JLL highlighted Sun Pharmaceuticals’ $20.2 million acquisition of a 99,740-square-foot facility in Princeton from seller ML7. In March, the New Jersey Economic Development Authority (NJEDA) board approved $5.24 million in tax credits under the Emerge Program to support Sun’s new U.S. headquarters in Princeton. As part of the agreement, Sun will remain in New Jersey for a minimum of 11 years.
So far in Q3, Thermo Fisher Scientific announced it is buying Sanofi’s sterile drug product manufacturing facility in Ridgefield, New Jersey, expanding its strategic partnership with the French drugmaker to enable additional production capacity in the U.S. The site, which specializes in fill‑finish and packaging of aseptic injectable medications, will continue to manufacture a portfolio of therapies for Sanofi.
At the same time, Eli Lilly is planning to sell its production site in Branchburg, New Jersey, as part of the drugmaker’s broader global manufacturing strategy as it moves away from monoclonal antibodies toward more complex biologics.
“Amid ongoing macroeconomic and funding uncertainties, many New Jersey life sciences companies are likely to maintain a cautious approach to their real estate decisions, mirroring a trend seen in other major U.S. life sciences cluster markets,” JLL concluded in its report.
Benson commented that while the state may see more conservative leasing in the second half of 2025 due to capital market pressures, the first half of the year “underscores that New Jersey remains a premier destination for biotech and pharmaceutical growth.”
Manufacturing talent
According to NJEDA, New Jersey is home to the headquarters or major facilities of 14 of the world’s largest biopharmaceutical companies, employing 115,000 people, and including more than 400 biotechnology companies.
The need for skilled technical and manufacturing talent is critical to New Jersey’s life sciences sector, a market that competes with the Boston area just up the I-95 corridor. The Massachusetts hub remains a formidable competitor.
In its 2025 annual analysis of 100 U.S. life sciences markets, Boston-Cambridge beat out New York-New Jersey for the top spot when it comes to manufacturing talent after Boston posted a greater gain in biological and chemical technicians, according to commercial real estate services and investment firm CBRE.
“Gains in these professions give Boston an edge in more sophisticated biomanufacturing talent, whereas New York-New Jersey has an advantage in talent for high-volume pharmaceutical manufacturing,” CBRE said in its June 2025 announcement.
Nonetheless, CBRE’s 2024 U.S. Life Sciences Talent Trends report differentiated between the staffing needs of a large pharmaceutical company’s high-volume production facility compared to a smaller cell and gene therapy organization.
“The leading life sciences manufacturing markets range from historic leaders in pharmaceutical, medicine and chemical manufacturing, like New York-New Jersey, Chicago and Philadelphia, to markets with greater biotechnology presence like Boston-Cambridge, the San Francisco Bay Area and San Diego,” CBRE said in last year’s report.
This year, workforce downsizings continue to overshadow the life sciences industry, according to JLL’s Q2 2025 New Jersey report, which noted that Bristol Myers Squibb laid off 68 positions at its Lawrenceville facility.
However, Benson said that even amid broader economic uncertainty and workforce restructuring, JLL is seeing targeted investments in “high-quality, amenity-rich office and lab space that support innovation and talent retention” in New Jersey.
Michelle Rozo, vice chair of the bipartisan National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology, said in a statement last week that New Jersey’s biotech industry is “building great momentum” and is “poised to be a national leader not only in innovation, but also in building our biomanufacturing capacity and educating the next generation of our biotechnology workforce.”
