Cancer. An emotive word, especially as one in three of us may suffer from the disease in our lifetime. Great strides have been made over the last 50 years in both understanding this complex malady and developing treatments and drugs.

Prof Nick LaThangue, managing director of Celleron Therapeutics, said: "The problem is knowing which drugs will be effective against which cancers and at what stage, or stages, of the disease.

"There are about 100 cancers and each one goes through several different phases, from onset to late stage. At each stage, the cancer changes.

"A drug producing response at one stage is unlikely to do so at another. Understanding which stage will be sensitive to which drug is the key to successful treatment."

Prof LaThangue's company focuses on cancer, particularly solid tumours, and is developing targeted medicines to responsive tumours.

He added: "Research over the last 50 years has given us a real understanding of the nature and structure of cancers and their progression.

"But although new drugs have been developed in that time, the rate of development and an understanding of how to target them have not really kept pace.

"There are probably 60 drugs out there, with a top 25. The standard approach is to give a drug, or combination of drugs, increasing the dosage as the cancer progresses. These attack healthy cells too, so you get side effects.

"Our targeted system means level doses of different drugs at each stage, so it's aimed at better treatment and reduced side effects."

Celleron has patented CancerNav, which uses a signal called a biomarker to predict the sensitivity of tumours to particular drugs.

This genetic screening process has been successfully tested not only in the laboratory, but also on live tissue from cancer patients.

There is still no cure for most solid tumour cancers, with the occasional exception, such as testicular cancer.

Treatments are there to manage the illness, to reduce the cancer from acute to chronic. The Celleron system allows better response, with goals of increased quality of life and life expectancy.

Celleron's pipeline includes a number of anti-cancer products. CT100 exploits quercetin, a naturally occurring substance in things like red wine and vegetables that has widely acclaimed cancer inhibition properties.

The CT100 programme enters Phase I clinical trials later this year, Phase II in 2009 and will initially be focused on prostate cancer.

CT200 is a clinical stage product that targets chromatin and its anti-cancer properties. CancerNav has identified a single biomarker that regulates tumour cells responsive to this treatment.

CT300 looks at cell cycle checkpoints, which act in quality control functions and stimulate cell death in response to abnormalities or mutations in DNA.

These checkpoints are disabled in tumour cells - Celleron has discovered how to switch them on again.

Also, the company is buying in an increasing number of products which it will enhance before resale.

Incorporated in 2004, Celleron offers an ideal investment vehicle in a market wary of speculative financing of drug discovery, where lead times are long and risks high.

Targeted Phase II and III trials will rapidly bring drugs to the patient and strong investment returns over a short time cycle.

Already, Celleron has attracted funding from venture capital firms, private investors and a public company.

The difficulties associated with cancer drugs have led the big pharma companies to turn their attentions elsewhere - the cancer drug pipeline is drying up.

"We will have a portfolio of six or seven products" explained Prof LaThangue.

"The idea is to bring them to market ourselves, but we haven't ruled out selling them back to their originators at substantial multiples of the purchase price. Either route will add significant value to Celleron.

"We plan to sell the company in about five years, if all goes well."

Celleron is using an outsourcing model, with headquarters in Milton Park and employing the outstanding scientists, clinicians and resources of Oxford University and other centres of excellence.

While it currently has six staff, an extensive recruitment campaign is now underway for project co-ordinators and clinical staff. Final staffing will be around 30.

Prof LaThangue is no stranger to starting companies - this is his fifth. He founded successful cancer drug discovery company Prolifix in 1995 as a spin-out from the Medical Research Council.

He said: "I formed Celleron out of a sense of frustration. I wanted total control over a company, something I'd never had before.

"I'm Professor of Cancer Biology here at the Institute of Cancer Medicine, and my skill is translating drugs from the laboratory to the patient.

"So I have a foot in both the academic and the commercial camps, which I love."