Abraxis BioScience Inc., a Los Angeles-based biotechnology company, is set to buy the Costa Mesa office that previously served as the headquarters for Valeant Pharmaceuticals International.
If the deal now in escrow closes, it will be the largest office sale here so far this year and could bring jobs to the county.
Abraxis, which makes drugs to treat cancer and other diseases and counts a recent market value of $2 billion, last month entered into a deal to buy 3300 Hyland Ave., a distinctive black granite building that faces the San Diego (I-405) Freeway in Costa Mesa.
It’s unclear if Abraxis would use the building as an additional facility or as its headquarters. Abraxis officials declined to comment with the deal still pending.
As the deal now is structured, Abraxis would pay $30.5 million for the roughly 180,000-square-foot, three-story building.
To date, the biggest office deal in OC this year was Irvine-based Allergan Inc.’s March buy of an office building that borders its campus from Los Angeles-based Maguire Properties Inc. for $22 million.
The $30.5 million Costa Mesa building price would represent a drop of nearly 20% for the building in a little more than two years, the last time the building traded hands.
It’s also well below the $45 million listing price set by the current owners, investors led by Boston’s AEW Capital Management LP.
According to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Abraxis has deposited $1 million into an escrow account for the 15-acre property.
Brokers involved in the deal said Abraxis likely would use about 70,000 square feet of space at the office, primarily laboratory space previously used by Valeant.
The remainder of the building, which doesn’t include lab space, could be leased out to other businesses.
There are two companies in discussions to take most of the non-lab space, according to brokers with Voit Commercial Brokerage LP, which is marketing the property.
Voit had been marketing the office space at the property at monthly rental rates near $2 per square foot.
In January, Abraxis said is was planning to spin off a business that focuses on biomarkers and personalized medicine to focus on cancer drugs.
It’s assumed that the new business line, known as Abraxis Health, also would be based in Los Angeles.
The company owns and leases 893,200 square feet of space around the globe, including three locations in California.
It leases 50,700 square feet in Marina del Rey for research and regulatory affairs in a lease that runs through August 2011. Its 60,900-square-foot Wilshire Boulevard headquarters has a lease that runs until July 2012.
Former Life
If the sale goes through, it would represent another chapter in a building that has plenty of history.
Valeant sold the building in early 2007 for a reported $38 million and moved its headquarters to Aliso Viejo.
That move partially was seen as an attempt to distance Valeant from its days as ICN Pharmaceuticals Inc. under autocratic founder and former Chief Executive Milan Panic.
The Costa Mesa complex was closely identified with Panic, who was ousted by dissident shareholders in 2002.
Valeant’s now on the search for another location for its headquarters, after several rounds of job cuts made its current 109,948-square-foot location at One Enterprise Drive in Aliso Viejo too large and costly.
A partnership led by AEW Capital Management bought the Hyland property and set about updating it.
The new owners put in a substantial amount of renovations to the property since the sale that could have cost up to $15 million. Work included changes to the exterior of the building, along with landscaping and asbestos-related cleanup work to the interior. Valeant also put in a reported $20 million in renovations to the building around 2002.
