AstraZeneca to sell Alderley Park site to Manchester Science Parks

AstraZeneca has found a buyer for its Alderley Park site in Cheshire, thereby securing the future of the research centre.

Manchester Science Parks, a Greater Manchester-based public-private partnership and science park operator, will pay an undisclosed fee to take ownership of the 400-acre location, meaning it will remain in use as a life science and biotechnology campus.

The sale comes as part of AstraZeneca's plans to create a new global research and development centre and corporate headquarters in Cambridge in 2016. The deal will be finalised later this month, with AstraZeneca remaining a key tenant on the site.

Around 700 members of the company's staff will continue on in Cheshire in non-research and development roles. Approximately 3,000 people will be employed across Alderley Park, its Macclesfield manufacturing site and the MedImmune vaccine manufacturing facility in Speke.

Pascal Soriot, chief executive officer of AstraZeneca, said: "The new owner is committed to building on AstraZeneca’s life science legacy at the site and ensuring it remains a centre of biotechnology innovation in the North West of England."

The new headquarters will be located at Cambridge Biomedical Campus and will employ a highly-skilled workforce of approximately 2,000 people. Herzog and de Meuron was appointed as the architect for the project at the end of last year.