Morrison & Foerster's (MoFo) London office has landed a role advising biotech company CellCentric on its $200m (£134m) out-licensing of a research programme focusing on cancer.

CellCentric has out-licensed the development and commercialisation of the programme to Japanese drugs firm Takeda Pharmaceutical Company.

The MoFo team – which includes co-head of life sciences Julian Thurston and associate James Ryan – are working closely with Millenium Pharmaceuticals, which is responsible for parent company Takeda's global oncology development strategy. Millenium turned to its in-house team for legal advice, led by Janice Potts.

Under the terms of the new agreement, CellCentric will receive an upfront payment, pre-clinical and clinical milestones, as well as royalties from Takeda. Therapeutic research will be initiated by Takeda's Research Group. Development of molecules stemming from this agreement will be completed by Millennium, which since May 2008 is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Takeda. The overall deal will be worth in excess of $200m (£133.9m).

With large pharmaceutical companies increasingly keen to bolster their pipelines, there have been a growing number of out-licensing deals in the market in recent months. This deal demonstrates the growing commercial interest in the emerging area of epigenetics (non-genetic influences over cellular expression) and novel epigenetic targets.

Ryan commented: "The life sciences is one of our core business areas, and therefore this deal is of great importance to us. It is very rewarding to work with the CellCentric team because they strongly rely on our deal knowledge."