CRB celebrates 40 years | BioBuzz

CRB celebrates 40 years

A company that started in a Missouri basement in 1984 has grown into a leading engineering and consulting firm with offices around the world. Driven by its core principles of collaboration, responsibility, technical excellence, entrepreneurship and fun, CRB looks to the next phase.

By Alex Keown | May 6, 2024

A life science service provider for 40 years CRB has established itself as a leading provider of sustainable engineering, architecture, construction and consulting solutions for the global life sciences and food and beverage industries.

CRB designs and builds life sciences facilities that are capable of changing the medical world. For four decades, privately held CRB has served its clients by providing integrated project delivery, design, construction, pre-construction and procurement across its core service areas. CRB’s reputation is built around five central values: collaboration, responsibility, technical excellence, entrepreneurship and fun. These values ​​play an important role internally, but also in the way the company collaborates with its customers.

Over its forty years, CRB has served clients around the world by striving for the highest standards in technical expertise, creativity and execution.

“I look back on these 40 years with incredible satisfaction and a deep sense of gratitude and happiness,” wrote Ryan Schroeder, president and CEO of CRB, in a piece distributed to CRB’s more than 1,300 employees during the company’s anniversary month . “CRB has rewarded me with the opportunity to experience this company from virtually every perspective imaginable. I have grown from a wide-eyed young engineer who learned the ropes on important projects, to a leader who has the extreme privilege of mentoring and standing alongside highly talented, technically excellent professionals in our pursuit of difference-making projects for customers.”

The company was founded in 1984 in the basement of a house in Liberty, Missouri. It would have been difficult for founders Jeff Biskup, Doyle Clark and Gerry Richardson – three mechanical engineers with a desire to innovate and find creative solutions to help customers – to imagine how their company would scale up and undertake projects of increasing scale and complexity would take on. In the early years, CRB mainly worked with pharmaceutical veterinary agricultural companies that were looking for effective solutions at lower costs. And that required innovative thinking from the CRB team to operate within the industry’s strict regulatory guidelines. CRB rose to the challenge and today the company operates in multiple countries around the world, driven by that same mission-driven sense of purpose to deliver world-class life sciences facilities.

In 2022, CRB was promised three Facility of the Year Awards from the International Society for Pharmaceutical Engineering (ISPE). The facilities for which CRB was recognized are maintained by Catalent Pharma Solutions, Takeda Pharmaceuticals and Iovance Biotherapeutics.

In addition to serving its customers, CRB was also instrumental in establishing guidelines that are used throughout the industry today. CRB experts have contributed to the development of the International Society of Pharmaceutical Engineers Baseline Guides, the Original Baseline Guide for Water and Steam Systems, and other guides.

To continue serving its customers at the highest level for the next 40 years, CRB is upgrading and expanding its presence in the United States, Canada and Europe.

New locations

This month, CRB unveiled its newest office in St. Louis. In 1990, CRB initially opened its St. Louis office, the company’s second. The new space is adjacent to CRB’s current location in St. Louis and emphasizes natural light, flexible collaboration space and amenities designed to enhance both the employee and customer experience.

The new St. Louis office is located on the top floor and features an open floor plan designed to provide city views from virtually anywhere in the office. CRB has opted for lower workplace walls, allowing natural light to flow throughout the office. Other modern office features include mobile glass walls that can expand conference rooms, zoned audio equipment, open spaces for collaboration and dedicated quiet areas. Facilities also include a café and a wellness centre.

The St. Louis location may be the company’s newest location, but it’s not the only one. In June 2023, the company opened an office in New Jersey to serve clients in that state and support existing offices from the BioHealth Capital Region to Philadelphia and Toronto. It was the company’s 21^st office and the fifth in the northeastern United States.

The New Jersey location allows the company to support customer programs ranging from research and development to commercial-scale manufacturing. The New Jersey office provides CRB with direct access to a strong pipeline of engineering, design, construction and architectural talent. It also allowed the company to be close to innovative scientific centers developing new therapies and approaches to treat a plethora of diseases and indications.

When CRB opened the New Jersey location, the company wanted to provide its employees with multiple amenities to support a strong work-life balance. In addition to investments in furniture and technologies, CRB’s location also includes a courtyard, café and fitness center.

The New Jersey location became a model for the renovations CRB is making to other offices throughout the area.

Updating sites for the future

As CRB looks to the next 40 years, the company is renovating some of its offices to meet the needs of its customers and the employees who work there.

In March this year, the company renovated the 15,000 square foot office in Emeryville, California. The company has updated the site with a modern layout and improved technology. The renovated location also benefits from sensational views of San Francisco Bay. The updates to the office, located in the Emeryville Public Market, were inspired by suggestions from CRB staff. The renovation provides the company with a flexible space that encourages collaboration and innovative thinking and collaboration among employees.

The design concept leans towards collaboration. The canteen and charrette area are designed to support multiple gatherings of small and large groups. The charrette room also serves as a library for the office and as a brainstorming room for teams.

While collaboration is critical to the California office, CRB remained mindful of the need for quiet, focused workspaces. The office is color-coded to indicate which spaces are available for collaboration or used for quiet work.

CRB’s Emeryville location serves a wide range of biopharmaceutical customers, from established well-known companies to exciting new startups.

Last year CRB moved its office to Philadelphia to a new location in the new Seven Tower Bridge building in Conshohocken, Pennsylvania. CRB acquired 26,670 square feet of space to house 150 employees. The new location is positioned to support customers within Cellicon Valley, nicknamed Philadelphia’s biopharmaceutical hub due to the rise of cell and gene therapy companies and research in the area.

The move to Conshohocken will bring CRB employees and their expertise to universities, start-up companies and research and development organizations that are part of Philadelphia’s vibrant and extensive life sciences community. The space includes conference rooms, collaboration areas and an architecture and interior design library.

Like the Emeryville location, CRB’s Philadelphia office offers employees spaces designed to encourage collaboration. An open floor plan and “neighborhood” layout allows team members to collaborate on various projects in dedicated spaces to best meet the needs of CRB’s clients.

Other campground amenities include large windows that let in ample natural light, close proximity to the Schuylkill River Trail, and a fully equipped on-site fitness room.

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Alex Keown is a freelance journalist who writes on a variety of topics including the pharmaceutical, biotech and life science industries. Before freelancing, Alex was a writer and editor for several publications.