Life sciences firm closing 2 maryland facilities, laying off workers

International life sciences firm Catalent is shutting down two large Maryland facilities and laying off workers, public records show. The company is laying off a combined 135 workers at 20

Firstfield Road in Gaithersburg and 9920 Belward Campus Drive in Rockville, according to the State of Maryland's Work Adjustment and Retraining Notifications registry. The registry

categorizes the layoffs as part of a plant closure.  Catalent didn't respond to a request for comment, nor did it mention the layoffs in its most recent earnings call Nov. 1. But Chief

Financial Officer Tom Castellano did mention that cost savings initiatives were underway, according to a transcript from SeekingAlpha. The two properties are owned by Alexandria Real Estate

Equities, which declined to comment for this story. An affiliate of the national life sciences real estate REIT acquired the 51K SF Rockville property for almost $36M in 2018, and it bought

the 56K SF Gaithersburg property for $18M in 2000, according to property records. Both are part of medical office campuses owned by Alexandria in the Shady Grove research cluster, according

to financial documents from the firm. The Catalent layoffs were posted Nov. 16, one day after life sciences firm NexImmune posted its own Gaithersburg layoffs affecting 30% of the

company's workforce. NexImmune will retain approximately 50 employees and focus on a proprietary technology that would inject nanoparticles into the body to create an immune response,

the Washington Business Journal reported.