Manhattan, NY The Janus Property Company said that Manhattanville Factory District and Mink Building tenant, Volastra Therapeutics, has renewed its lease. Volastra is a clinical stage cancer biotechnology company focused on exploiting chromosomal instability. It occupies 15,000 s/f of class A wet lab and office space that includes access to a shower and changing room for staff who bike to work. The company’s original lease was signed in the early days of COVID, when Janus and the Mink Building continued to operate.

“We remain proud of Volastra’s incredible growth and success while at the Mink Building and look forward to their continued success,” said Scott Metzner, principal at Janus. “There is no question that the Factory District remains the single best life science cluster and campus in the City, offering space options from a single seat to graduation space to small, medium or large labs up to the 350,000 s/f Taystee Lab Building. The neighborhood’s quiet tree-lined streets and our private landscaped passageway running from West 125^th St. to West 128^th St. provides a convenient university triangle connecting us to Columbia University and CUNY’s landmark City College, home to the Advance Research Science Center and New York Structural Biology Center.” Our location, whether relative to the five boroughs, New Jersey, upstate New York, or to or from the airports or train stations is easily the most accessible of any life science location,” he said.

Volastra recently closed on a $60m Series A led by founding investors, Polaris Partners and ARCH Venture Partners, alongside Eli Lilly and Company, bringing its total raise to more than $100m in two years. Additionally, Volastra secured a $1.1b collaboration with Bristol Meyers Squibb to drive drug discovery using CIN-based synthetic lethality approaches to induce tumor cell death. To complement both clinical and discovery efforts, Volastra has built a strong partnership with Microsoft to develop (AI) technologies for the high throughput histopathological identification of CIN. 

Volastra also recently secured its first clinical-stage asset, sovilnesib, a small-molecule K1F18A inhibitor licensed on an exclusive global basis (ex-China) from Amgen. Sovilnesib is currently proceeding through a phase 1 trial in patients with advanced solid tumors, having already picked up fast-track designation from the FDA to treat platinum-resistant, high grade serous ovarian cancer. 

“We are excited to add sovilnesib to our growing pipeline of CIN-targeted therapeutics which includes our own KIF18A inhibitor, VLS-1488,” said Charles Hugh-Jones, chief executive officer at Volastra. 

“Our focus is helping patients in critical need of new treatment options,” said Scott Drutman, MD PhD, chief medical officer. “In-licensing sovilnesib broadens our options to accelerate development of therapies against a promising new target.”

Volastra is one of numerous life sciences tenants in the 150,000 s/f Mink Building including Renal Research Institute, Avantus Renal Therapy, Hemogenyx Pharmaceuticals, BioBus, Harlem Biospace II at Mink, Hypothekids and Quicksilver Therapeutics. Additionally, the City Innovations Collaborative recently announced a 37,000 s/f lab and maker space at the Taystee Lab Building across the street.