A burgeoning biotech company focused on developing treatments for skin disorders has moved to a new lab and office space in Branford.
Azitra Inc. this week announced the opening of its new 12,000-square-foot home at 21 Business Park Drive.
The company, founded in 2014 by Yale University scientists, had outgrown its prior location in Farmington. Management has cited the need for more room to accommodate the company’s continued growth as the motivation for the move.
Azitra is a clinical-stage medical dermatology company working to cure skin conditions by harnessing the microbiome, bacteria living on the skin. Its staff is currently focused on developing treatments for rashes related to cancer therapy; eczema; Netherton syndrome, a chronic genetic skin disease; and ichthyosis vulgaris, a condition marked by the accumulation of dead skin cells.
Richard Andrews, president and CEO, said Azitra’s prior home at UConn’s Technology Incubator Program in Farmington, with its research facilities, served the company well when it was an early-stage enterprise.
“We have also been fortunate to grow beyond the early research stage and are now supplementing our research focus and entering a new stage of clinical development,” Andrews said in an announcement. “The Branford complex lets us do this from one core location.”
Jeanne Bertonis, Azitra’s chief operating officer, also said the Branford space has the capacity to meet the company’s current and future needs, as it expands its clinical and commercial activities.
Azitra is currently scaling up clinical development, including for its lead drug candidate, ATR-04, for rash associated with cancer treatment, and ATR-12, for Netherton syndrome.
Company management has also indicated that the Branford space’s proximity to I-95 and the rail line was attractive
State Sen. Christine Cohen (D-12), co-chair of the legislature’s Bioscience Caucus, said the company’s move is “more evidence of the density of bioscience research going on now” in the New Haven region.
Contact Michelle Tuccitto Sullo at msullo@newhavenbiz.com.
