How Supply Chain Shifts Are Reshaping Lab Design and Construction

Lab location has always mattered, says Louis Rosenthal, director of global development research for Trammell Crow Company. But for specialized spaces like labs, being close to talent, infrastructure, and production hubs (such as Worcester, MA, where biomanufacturing is leveraging proximity to the major R&D institutions in Cambridge and Boston) makes all the difference.

In 2025, the reconfiguration of global supply chains is fundamentally altering the industrial real estate landscape—and lab facilities are right in the middle of this transformation. Lab planners, end users, and equipment vendors must now navigate a logistics environment increasingly shaped by nearshoring, supply chain resiliency, and advanced manufacturing.

These forces are creating new clusters of demand in previously overlooked regions and reinforcing a central truth of real estate: location matters—perhaps more than ever.

As global trade becomes more volatile and the US tariff rate climbs, the national strategy is shifting toward regional production ecosystems that are more resilient and closer to end markets. This structural realignment is expanding the footprint of advanced manufacturing—including biomanufacturing—and driving demand for lab space that is not only highly technical but also deeply integrated with the supply chain.

“I think what we’re seeing with nearshoring and supply chain diversification is a deeper push toward clustering, or bringing advanced manufacturing and the supporting ecosystem closer together,” Louis Rosenthal, director of global development research for Trammell Crow Company, tells Lab Design News. “This applies to biomanufacturing as well, which is an even more specialized form of advanced manufacturing.”

This growing emphasis on clustering is transforming the way lab space is planned and located. Today’s most strategic lab developments are emerging not just in academic cores, but alongside logistics hubs and manufacturing corridors—in places like Phoenix, AZ; Atlanta, GA; Reno, NV; and Worcester, MA. These locations are prized for their ability to connect R&D with prototyping, production, and distribution.

“For lab space, location is critical because these aren’t interchangeable boxes you can drop anywhere,” Rosenthal emphasizes. “Proximity to other parts of the cluster is essential. The most valuable locations are those where R&D and production are closely linked; where collaboration between scientists and engineers can occur; where innovations can be tested and tweaked before scaling; where quality control happens on site, and so on.”

Lab planners and developers must now evaluate not only a building’s technical specifications, but also its adjacency to workforce talent, transportation infrastructure, and upstream/downstream partners. This new reality makes granular site selection essential. Forward-looking tools like the Logistics Development Index (LDI) can help project teams assess which submarkets are positioned to support integrated R&D-production ecosystems.

“So in a way, this trend reinforces what’s always been true in real estate: location matters,” Rosenthal remarks. “But with something as specialized as lab space, location likely matters even more because labs should ideally be embedded within larger clusters of talent, infrastructure, and production that allow them to thrive.”

For lab users embarking on new builds or renovations, this shift presents both opportunities and risks. Aligning site selection with logistics realities and industry clustering will be key to long-term success. Likewise, lab equipment vendors must evolve to meet regionalized demand with localized support, adaptable systems, and faster delivery to decentralized markets.

The supply chain reset isn’t just changing where things get made—it’s changing where innovation happens. For labs, that means discovery, development, and production are coming together in new places and in new ways. It’s pushing teams to rethink how and where they build, with a more connected, strategic approach to real estate planning.