ALISO VIEJO, CA-Avanir Pharmaceuticals Inc. has signed a lease with property owner Parker Properties to relocate the drug firm's headquarters to 29,790 square feet of class A office space at Parker's 20 Enterprise building in July. According to Drew Netherton, a senior vice president with UGL Services who led a UGL team that represented the drug company in lease negotiations, “Avanir needed a larger space to allow for future growth."

Netherton and UGL services senior vice president Justin Hodgdon represented Avanir. A UGL announcement regarding the deal said, "Various relocation scenarios in Orange County were considered, but 20 Enterprise proved most optimal." It said that the new lease "took advantage of a high improvement allowance on first-generation space in a highly visible location." Parker Properties was represented by a CB Richard Ellis team of Jake Stickel, Carol Trapani, Ted Snell and Allison Schneider, all of CBRE's Newport Beach office.

The announcement regarding Avanir's relocation did not say how many square feet the company occupies at its current headquarters at 101 Enterprise or when its current lease is due to expire. However, Avanir's latest annual report, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission in December, stated: "Our headquarters and commercial and administrative offices are located in Aliso Viejo, California, where we currently occupy approximately 17,000 square feet. The Aliso Viejo office lease expires in June 2011. With the organizational growth anticipated following the October 2010 FDA approval of Nuedexta, we have determined that we will need to increase our current office space capacity."

Financial terms of the lease were undisclosed. The average asking rate for class A office space in the South Orange County market, which includes Aliso Viejo, was $2.06 per square foot per month in the fourth quarter of 2010, according to the latest market report from CB Richard Ellis. The average class A rate in Orange County in the fourth quarter was $2.14 per square foot per month, according to the CBRE report.

Avanir's new space is in a Silver LEED-certified building of 118,000 square feet at the Summit Office Campus and was completed in 2008. Avanir specializes in acquiring, developing, and commercializing products for the treatment of central nervous system disorders.