Pfizer Considers Its Options In Kalamazoo

Pfizer will look for alternatives for a research facility in Kalamazoo, Mich., after the Western Michigan University Foundation withdrew from a deal to buy the site. WMUF had agreed to pay $3.8 million for the building, which was to be used for faculty research and to house private-sector firms, but it determined the estimated $1.5 million to $2 million annual operating cost would be prohibitively expensive. The facility, which sits on one of three campuses in Kalamazoo County that came to Pfizer through its 2003 acquisition of Pharmacia, received a $35 million investment in the late 1990s. A spokesman says the company's options are to sell, donate, mothball, or demolish the site.