FloridaWest Economic Development Alliance announced today that CIRCULOGENE will be expanding its operations into downtown Pensacola, Florida. CIRCULOGENE, an innovative medical technology company, will be testing cancer patients worldwide from their downtown facility. The expansion into Escambia County has created ten jobs so far and is expected to create up to seventy new jobs within four years with an average wage of more than 230% of the current average.
FloridaWest Economic Development Alliance has been working with the company since August 2020 and, along with the University of West Florida, has been supporting the company’s expansion through the Industry Resilience and Diversification (IRDF) grant.
“The University of West Florida is proud to support FloridaWest and other regional partners in facilitating the expansion of new businesses into northwest Florida for the joint benefits of creating new jobs and diversifying our regional workforce. As CIRCULOGENE has demonstrated, the IRDF fund can play a substantial role in supporting those efforts,†noted Matthew Schwartz, UWF Associate Vice President of Research Administration.
“CIRCULOGENE chose Pensacola’s I-10 corridor as a great location to establish its proprietary diagnostics services within the southeast gulf coast states,†said Scott Luth, CEO of FloridaWest Economic Development Alliance. “Pensacola is renowned for its medical facilities and advanced manufacturing companies, and CIRCULOGENE is a great addition to our growing biotech sector.â€
“CIRCULOGENE has been operating its lab in Birmingham, Alabama for the past six years, but with more oncologists sending in blood for molecular profiling, it made sense not only to expand our footprint but to do so in Pensacola close to one of our largest growing markets,†said Mike Mullen, President and CEO of CIRCULOGENE. “Of all the locations we considered for this expansion, we found Pensacola to be ideal, and FloridaWest’s assistance was another deciding factor.â€
CIRCULOGENE will be the first company to establish a Molecular DNA testing laboratory dedicated to cancer diagnostics in Pensacola. They will receive patient samples from all over the world to test for genetic mutations of their cancers in an effort to realize more effective treatment strategies for patients.