One of the main storylines in pandemic-era commercial real estate has been the decline of retail and rise of life sciences. Outside San Francisco, a planned big-box-to-biotech deal will be a physical manifestation of these changes, and it may suggest new targets for life sciences developers seeking to meet continued demand for space.

Alexandria Real Estate Equities has acquired a JCPenney location at the Tanforan Mall in San Bruno, a city near the explosion of life sciences development in South San Francisco. The site offers 700K SF of redevelopment potential, the San Francisco Business Journal reports, and Alexandria plans to demolish and redevelop the site when existing leases expire.

The seller, Copper Property CTL Pass Through Trust, owned the site via an earlier acquisition of property from the ailing retailer, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in May, announcing the closure of 175 stores.

During the same investor call where Alexandria executives noted the acquisition, the firm reported 5.6M SF of acquisitions in Q3, worth $989.7M, and has added more than 1.1M SF of new development to its pipeline.