Astellas Pharma Inc. badly wanted to expand its rights to FibroGen Inc. 's oral anemia compounds beyond Japan. So badly, in fact, that it paid a whopping $300 million up front, agreed to up to $465 million in pre-approval milestones, and will fund half of the compounds' development in Europe and North America. [See Deal] Yet Astellas doesn't even get North American commercial rights in exchange: it had to settle for European and other ex-US territories.
Even so, the Japanese pharma had to fight hard to win the deal. There were plenty of bigger Big Pharmas...