All photos courtesy: New Brunswick Development Corp.
By Real Estate NJ
New Brunswick Development Corp. on Friday welcomed a crowd of public officials and other well-wishers to the site of its high-profile HELIX project, joining a large team of laborers to top out the first of three buildings at the planned life sciences and technology campus.
The event, which was slated to draw some 200 to a site off Paterson Street, marked the completion of the steel frame for the 12-story, 574,000-square-foot structure downtown that’s slated to welcome a host of major tenants in 2026. The building known as H-1 will include new homes for both Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and Rutgers University’s translational research platform, plus an incubator known as the New Jersey Innovation HUB that will cater to startups of all shapes and sizes.
SLIDESHOW: HELIX H-1 tops out in New Brunswick
Substantial completion for the $732 million facility is slated for late 2025. It will be part of planned four-acre, 1.5 million-square-foot project officially known as the Health & Life Science Exchange, whose second phase will include a 360,000-square-foot lab and office tower by SJP Properties for Nokia’s iconic Bell Labs division.
Devco joined its project team and other supporters on Friday for a topping out ceremony after having assembled nearly 5,200 pieces of steel and poured some 12,800 cubic yards of concrete. And the first 800 of what will be 3,000 exterior wall panels will begin arriving later this month to the site just south of Albany Street.
The master developer expects the first members of the New Jersey Innovation HUB to arrive in the first quarter of 2026. Expected occupants include the state’s Economic Development Authority, RWJBarnabas Health, Hackensack Meridian Health, Middlesex County and Rutgers, which will help populate nearly 70,000 square feet of anchor tenant space and operate alongside the roughly 55,000-square-foot incubator.
The Rutgers translational research facility, which will span nearly 250,000 square feet of high-end lab equipment and support space, will provide a place for collaboration among scientists from varied backgrounds. Meantime, Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School will occupy 160,000 square feet across four floors, allowing it to relocate from Piscataway, welcoming its first class to the HELIX in summer 2026.
