California's success stems in part from entrepreneurs who willingly defy the odds in pursuit of important missions. In 1938 Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard, working in their Palo Alto garage, launched one of the great technology companies of the 20th century. Since then, the story has repeated with variations many times—including the launch of Apple Computer from Steve Jobs's garage. However, garages are just not suitable for experiments in modern biology. Biotech entrepreneurs have therefore had a much harder time moving from idea to prototype, and this has reduced the rate of innovation.

To address this challenge, QB3 has created an incubator that allows very small com­panies access to modern laboratory space in close proximity to QB3 investigators. But this is not an incubator in the traditional sense. Rather, we have created the biological laboratory equivalent of a garage—a small space for inventive entrepreneurs to lay the foundations for what may be another great California company.

Our Facility

The QB3 Garage@UCSF features 2,500 square feet of offices, wet laboratory space, and multi-function rooms. Tenants rent at least one office or multi-function room and can then rent a portion of the wet laboratory space. An equipment corridor is also available.

Furthermore, Garage tenants can make arrangements to use the following QB3 core facilities:

• UCSF Nikon Imaging Center
• Center for Advanced Technology
• Membrane Protein Expression Center
• Small Molecule Discovery Center
• High Field NMR Biomarker Discovery Facilities
• Cell Culture Facility
• UCSF Mission Bay FAMRI Library
• Micro-Tomography Core Facility
• Micro and Nanofabrication Core
• Resource for Biocomputing, Visualization, and Informatics
  

 

Our Location

The QB3 Garage@UCSF is located in 219 Byers Hall on the UCSF Mission Bay campus. Click here for a building map. Mission Bay is situated between downtown San Francisco and the Potrero Hill area.

For a map of UCSF Mission Bay, please download this pdf: www.ucsf.edu/maps/mb.pdf

Criteria

Because of the limited space available, the QB3 Garage@UCSF is only available to spin-outs from QB3 or University of California laboratories, or to companies working in close collaboration with QB3 investigators. Space is made available at market rates for pre-commerical development for periods of up to 18 months.

Interested groups are encouraged to contact Douglas Crawford.