How a Serial Entrepreneur Plans to Bring Biotech Innovation Hubs to Colorado
When Afshin Safavi moved to Colorado with his wife and two daughters in 2016, he intended to retire. The serial entrepreneur and veteran biochemist had spent the first ten years of his career working for innovative pharmaceutical companies like Bayer, GSK, and Grifols. Then, he spent 15 years focused on leading bioanalytical teams developing safety and efficacy testing in support of biological products in preclinical and clinical-trial laboratories. By 2008, he had launched his own global contract research company, BioAgilytix Labs, which he sold—with plans to retire. But after settling down in the Centennial State, he saw a real need that he couldn’t ignore, the state’s booming life sciences and biotech ecosystem with a growing number of renowned researchers, scientists, and more than 1,000 bioscience-related companies. He established Colorado Health & Tech Centers (CHTC) with the goal to build one million square feet of biotech and lab space over the next ten years throughout Colorado.
