Blackstone Affiliate Engineers $361M Life Sciences Buy

Blackstone’s BioMed Realty purchased the ground lease at 730-750 Main Street in Cambridge for $361.5 million, the Boston Business Journal reported. The deal for the two-building, 223,000-square-foot complex in Kendall Square breaks down to more than $1,600 per square foot.

MIT was the seller of the property, which it started renovating in 2020. The complex is home to The Engine, a venture capital and investment firm spun out from the school as a company that targets robotics and climate tech companies.

The prestigious institution will continue to own the land underneath the complex. BioMed’s master lease agreement will be in place until the end of the century. An affiliate of BioMed landed a $181 million acquisition loan from AIG, Fidelity and more to finance the deal.

The property was formerly home to Polaroid; The Engine set up shop at the Kendall Square address two years ago. It leases space at 750 Main, the larger of the two buildings, which offers both lab and office space.

BioMed is a major player in the life sciences space, owning and operating properties in the Greater Boston area and beyond, though its acquisition activity in the region has been quiet as of late. The affiliate, run by Tim Schoen, is developing a 16-story property for Takeda Pharmaceuticals on Third Street in Kendall Square.

Due to its proximity to schools such as MIT and Harvard, Kendall Square is a hot market in the life sciences world. Boston Properties recently won a dispute against a biotechnology company as it sought to construct lab space there for AstraZeneca.

But the life sciences sector has cooled significantly since its heyday during the pandemic. In the first nine months and change of the year, only three assets in the sector traded hands across the country, according to a report from CommercialEdge. That’s down from $1.8 billion transacted in 20 sales last year and $6.2 billion transacted in 62 sales in 2022.

— Holden Walter-Warner