Cell Therapeutics, Inc. (CTI) has completed the acquisition of Systems Medicine, Inc. (SMi), a privately held oncology company, in a stock for stock merger valued at $20 million.

SMi stockholders could also receive a maximum of $15 million in additional consideration upon the achievement of certain regulatory milestones. The acquisition of SMi provides CTI with worldwide rights to Brostallicin, a DNA minor groove binding agent with proven anti-tumour activity. SMi will continue to operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of CTI.

SMi applies a systems biology approach to drug development, combining pharmacogenomics and bioinformatics with experienced preclinical, clinical, and regulatory expertise to find and exploit a specific cancer's 'context-of-vulnerability.' Specifically, SMi defines the molecular and genetic alterations (context) that cause cancer cells to be particularly sensitive (vulnerable) to a drug or combination of drugs-the 'context-of- vulnerability.'

Brostallicin, which was initially developed by Nerviano Medical Sciences, the largest pharmaceutical research and development facility in Italy, is a synthetic second-generation DNA minor groove binder with potent cancer killing activity in experimental tumours models. More than 200 patients have been treated with Brostallicin in single-agent and combination studies, and it is now in a first-line phase II study that is currently being conducted by the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC).