High Identity Buildings, HIB, created three years ago and located in Ondarroa, is a company specialising in technical consultancy, lab planning, engineering and architecture, which offers integral and personalised development for buildings with labs. Some of its clients in the Basque Bioregion are Genetadi, Innoprot, BTI, Idoki, Midatech, Bioftalmik, the recently opened Miramón Laboratories, and the Public Health Laboratories in Bizkaia, all of them situated in Technology Parks. Outside the Basque Country, HIB has been awarded lab planning projects for the new labs at La Fe Hospital in Valencia and Marqués de Valdecilla Hospital in Santander, as well as for their research buildings.

The company plans the labs from inside out, that is, it designs labs based on their needs and adapts the rest of the building to these needs. “This enables us to correct errors in traditional planning, and optimised labs with stimulating environments are created - well-planned and designed labs that put people's needs first,” explains Adelmo Antelo, general manager of HIB.

For the company management, a lab has to be “functional, flexible, accessible, productive, safe and environmentally-friendly; that is, it must be designed thinking of the people, either the workers or all those who may end up being affected by the activities carried out in the lab”.

Sustainability is another of the main objectives when building new labs. Last year, HIB also established the Maite Foundation (Environment, Innovation and Technology), whose mission is to encourage private and public institutions to pursue safe and functional buildings, oriented towards sustainability. The company also created the Spanish Network for Sustainable Laboratories.