The S.C. Research Authority plans to spend about $5 million to refurbish a downtown Charleston building into an incubator for biotech research and business development.

The Charleston Innovation Center will focus on biomedical and biopharmaceutical research conducted by the Medical University of South Carolina, said SCRA President Bill Mahoney.

"We've got a pretty good pipeline of companies that would be located in the building and are ready to get going," Mahoney said.

"The primary objective is better patient care, but if we can commercialize some of those discoveries, then everybody wins," he said. "This is the very early stages of commercialization. This is the germination state, the very, very early stages of the companies."

The city of Charleston negotiated a lease with the SCRA for a 28,000-square-foot building at 645 Meeting St., near the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge. Charleston City Council must approve the lease, which is for $1 per year for 30 years.

"It's really hard to overstate the importance of this," said Charleston Mayor Joe Riley. "That part of town has a terrific future and obviously to have a biotech incubator right in the heart of it is great for that area." If the lease is approved, Mahoney hopes to open the incubator in the fall of 2009.

Per the state Innovation Centers Act of 2005, SCRA must develop three research centers with MUSC, Clemson University and the University of South Carolina. The authority broke ground on a research center with Clemson earlier this year in Anderson. SCRA continues to work with USC to find space in Columbia, Mahoney said.