Real estate investor finds earnings success in ‘early days of biology revolution’

Despite real estate investors battling a looming recession, hiring slowdowns and higher interest rates, one firm is finding success at the "dramatic intersection" of biology and technology industries.

"The early days of the biology revolution is here," Alexandria Real Estate Equities founder and executive chairman Joel Marcus told FOX Business’ Maria Bartiromo Tuesday. "And I think Steve Jobs appropriately said many years ago the 21st century would be this dramatic intersection of technology and life science… We're seeing that combination really take off in a great way."

Alexandria's founder detailed the better-than-expected earnings for Q2 on "Mornings with Maria," reporting 26% revenue growth year-over-year. As the industry leader of life science tenants and leases, Marcus attributed the company’s growth to technology and biology innovation hubs.

"It's pretty clear that the technology sector has had such a huge run. Just imagine Amazon over the last 25 years, Google, Facebook, all these companies - many of whom actually come into our space because they want high-security buildings, they want to be kind of ensconced in a very above-standard kind of environment," Marcus explained. "So we tend to see a lot of them."

COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE FEELING ‘BIG SHOCKS’ AMID ‘TALE OF TWO WORLDS’: EXPERT

But macroeconomic factors such as slowed production and supply chain disruptions have created a hiring slowdown in the tech space, according to the real estate expert.

"We haven't seen that same thing from our thousand [life science] tenants," Marcus pointed out. "Remember, we've got 10,000 known diseases to humankind – only about 5% have been really addressed through therapies and cures."

After 30 years in the real estate sector, Marcus noted how establishing trust throughout a long history keeps tenants coming back.

"They entrust their very, very highly-trained technicians, researchers and laboratory workers to our environments that are safe, healthy and ones that you can't do lab work from home," Marcus said. "We've been able to buffet those headwinds, I think, in an extraordinary way with our team."

GET FOX BUSINESS ON THE GO BY CLICKING HERE

State-of-the-art commercial buildings are hard to come by, in Marcus’ opinion, which Alexandria Real Estate aims to solve.

"Class-A buildings in the great hubs of Cambridge, Seattle, New York City, San Diego, San Francisco, in the peninsula, really are scarce assets," Marcus pointed out. "So we've been able to recycle those assets, take our profits out of those, and invest in new assets — which has been, I think, a secret of our success."

READ MORE FROM FOX BUSINESS