A West Midlands law firm has been praised for its “top-class” work in helping an antigen development company move to a much-needed new facility in Oxford.
Higgs LLP, based in Brierley Hill, acted for The Native Antigen Company (TNAC) to negotiate and exchange on a 36,000 sqft new build at Oxford Technology Park.
The company was in desperate need of new laboratories, R&D facilities and offices as it accelerated its award-winning work, including helping to create vaccines in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Higgs was able to arrange exchange within six weeks of instruction during the height of the pandemic despite numerous challenges – and TNAC has this month completed on the state-of-the-art building.
Nick Roesen, Chief Operating Officer at The Native Antigen Company, praised Higgs project lead Cherry Elliott.
He said: “Cherry and the team at Higgs were an invaluable resource to achieve completion on our lease of Unit 3 Oxford Technology Park.
“We were able to draw on their expertise in a wide range of areas, and their communication and speed of work was top-class.
“They are, and continue to be, our go-to solicitors for estate legal work.”
Cherry said the deal had been a rollercoaster but that she was delighted with the outcome.
She said: “We had previously acted for The Native Antigen Company for a few matters so were pleased to do so again for this significant move.
“We received Heads of Terms halfway through August 2020, right in the midst of the pandemic outbreak.
“Working from our homes, we managed to complete due diligence and negotiate the deal to exchange within six weeks, which was no mean feat and required all of the Higgs commercial property team pulling together.
“We are delighted to have completed and the client can now enjoy a fantastic new facility.”
Also working on the deal were Peter Humpherson on property litigation and Rachael Hobbis on construction.
The Native Antigen Company develops and manufactures premium quality antigens and antibodies as well as offering a range of services to the diagnostic and biopharmaceutical industries.
The company, part of LGC's Clinical Diagnostics business unit, received awards for its efforts supporting the research and development of diagnostics and vaccines for Covid-19.
In February 2020, TNAC released the world's first commercially available SARS-CoV-2 Spike subunit 1 and 2 antigens, just 35 days after the genome was published, and has since developed an extensive range of antigens, antibodies, receptors and kits for SARS-CoV-2 and other human coronaviruses.
