Thriving UCSF needs all the space it can get

Sir

You state in a News story (Nature 418, 355; 200210.1038/418355b) that “biotech firms are turning down the chance to move into premises on a top university campus”. The concept that this university site is unattractive to companies is central to this article and is implied by the headline.

The University of California, San Francisco, (UCSF) is not seeking companies to move onto our property. We need every square foot we can get for our own laboratories at our new 43-acre research and teaching campus at Mission Bay. There is no $85-million commercial site vacant on UCSF property as stated in your article, nor will there ever be.

Your article confuses the Mission Bay campus with an adjacent 300-acre site owned by Catellus, a real-estate developer. UCSF's site is proceeding spectacularly, with buildings worth more than $800 million either under construction or in the planning stages. Attracting companies to the Catellus site is a marketing issue for the privately owned biotechnology park.