Owned by Alexandria Real Estate Equities, the building is known by its street address, 455 Mission Bay. Nektar says in an SEC filing that it will pay no rent for the first four years of its 9.5-year sublease commitment for upper west-wing floors the building. After that, it says the starting rent will be approximately $35 per square foot, triple net, which is well below the going biotech rate of $48 per square foot. The rent will top out at $41 per square foot per month.

Pfizer inked a 15-year pre-lease for the building in mid-2008 [http://www.globest.com/news/1213_1215/sanfrancisco/172866-1.html] but changed its mind in mid-2009 [http:///news/1446_1446/sanfrancisco/179676-1.html], shortly after acquiring Madison, NJ-based Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, a purchase that included a global real estate portfolio. Pfizer instead is keeping its R&D operation in South San Francisco at 259 East Grand Ave., the home of Rinat Neuroscience, a company it acquired in 2006.

As it was to do for Pfizer, Alexandria will fork over $15 million for tenant improvements. Nektar will spend an additional $15 million completing the build out, which will include administrative office space as well as an R&D center with biology, chemistry, pharmacology and clinical development capabilities.

Nektar says the Mission Bay facility will complement the company's research operations in Huntsville, AL, and Hyderabad, India. The company currently is developing pain relief, cancer and HIV drugs.

Mission Bay is slated for more than four million square feet of R&D space, about 2.7 million square feet of which has been built, is under construction or permitted. The total does not include the 43-acre, UCSF campus, which is slated for 2.7 million square feet and is about 60% built out.