The Greater Philadelphia area earned high marks for its efforts to attract life sciences companies, writes Alex Philippidis for Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News.

Since 2014, GEN has ranked regions across the U.S. on which are most competitive in drawing life science companies to their areas. Greater Philadelphia took the seventh spot in the Top 10.

The publication uses five criteria to determine each year’s ranking: National Institutes of Health funding, Venture capital funding, patents, lab space, and jobs.

Greater Philadelphia has become a major center for cell and gene therapy development over the last few years. Major players include the University of Pennsylvania’s Gene Therapy program led by Dr. James Wilson, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, The Wistar Institute, Spark Therapeutics, Passage Bio, and The Discovery Labs in King of Prussia.

This past March, Spark broke ground on a $575 million gene therapy innovation center within Drexel University in University City. A 223,000-square-foot research facility in Philadelphia is also being built by Breakthrough Properties.

In addition, Wistar has joined the Pennsylvania Biotechnology Center and Baruch S. Blumberg Institute in a partnership to invest in life-science start-ups.

Read more about life science companies in the Philadelphia area in Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News.

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More one Spark Therapeutics.