History of the Research Park

In 1982, the 30 acre University of Guelph Research Park was conceived as an academic initiative to enhance research at the University and foster links with other institutions. Over the next four years, zoning and infrastructure development took place. A multi-tenant building - the nucleus of the Research Park - would be built, and land would also be made available to companies and organizations to construct their own research facilities at market lease rates.

On July 17, 1984 the City passed a zoning by-law to permit development of the Research Park, then referred to as the "Technobusiness Park". In 1986, construction began on the Park's first building, the Agriculture Canada, Health of Animals Laboratory. Semex Canada, the export arm of Canada's artificial insemination industry for cattle, started construction on its building, the second in the Park, in January, 1987. The Park entrance, its signage, landscaping and the internal private road (Research Lane) were started in the spring of 1990 and completed by early summer 1991.

Next came the 53,000 square foot Agriculture Canada Regional Headquarters building, which opened in May, 1991, followed shortly after by the 40,000 square foot first phase of the University owned three storey multi-tenant Research Park Centre. The addition of the Centre's Phase II in 1994 increased the total rentable space to 60,000 square feet. Located on a 3.6 acre site, this multi-tenant facility allows state-of-the-art scientific facilities to be fitted flexibly into fully serviced space so that tenants can make optimum use of their location.

In December, 1997, Novartis Crop Protection Canada Inc. (now Syngenta) relocated its national headquarters to occupy a fifth building in the Research Park and in December, 1998, the Park's sixth building, another multi-tenant facility, the Jaral Centre, marked its opening. The Ontario Universities' Application Centre relocated its operation from the north-west area of Guelph, and joined the Park in occupying the seventh building in April, 2001, followed by the multi-tenant building at 130 Research Lane, which opened in November 2001.