BioMed Realty’s Gateway of Pacific Wins the BOMA TOBY Award for Excellence in Life Science Operations
BioMed Realty’s Gateway of Pacific campus has received the 2026 Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) Outstanding Building of the Year (TOBY) Award for Excellence in Life Science Operations.
As one of the most rigorous and respected recognitions in commercial real estate, the BOMA TOBY Award honors properties that represent the absolute pinnacle of building operations, sustainability, tenant experience, and overall asset performance. Following this local triumph, the 22.6-acre South San Francisco campus now advances to the Pacific Southwest Regional competition on its path toward the international stage.
The TOBY Award recognizes Gateway of Pacific for its best-in-class operations and its unmatched ability to support the highly specialized, data-intensive workflows of high-profile life science and technology tenants. As the integration of AI-enabled tools increases the demand for power capacity and infrastructure redundancy, the campus stands out as a model of operational reliability and uninterrupted uptime.
- 5
- Phases
- 10
- Buildings
Affiliated Engineers, Inc. (AEI) provided the full mechanical, electrical, piping/plumbing, technology, and high-performance building analysis services required to meet these elite operational standards across all five phases of this nearly 1.4-million-square-foot development. Envisioned to serve as a landmark new front door into the city, Gateway of Pacific required a holistic design approach that balances premium engineering functionality with striking architectural form. Navigating the diverse requirements of various stakeholders, including state, municipal, owner, and tenant entities, presented unique infrastructure challenges. Crucially, the campus had to satisfy the highly specific compliance demands of California’s L-Occupancy code classifications.
Because the high-rise facilities accommodate mixed-use laboratory and office space, they demand substantial airflow management. To maintain floor-plate efficiency and system flexibility across multiple tenants, AEI engineered a consolidated ventilation design. By delivering minimum ventilation to office zones and utilizing recirculating fan coil units and chilled beams, the design significantly downsized air handling equipment footprint while preserving long-term adaptability. Supporting strict sustainability and LEED® certification goals across all phases.
- 60%
- laboratory space
- 40%
- office space