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Systemic cytotoxic chemotherapy has benefited manypatients with haematological and solid tumours. However,the success of cytotoxic drugs is hampered by their tox-icity to non-tumour tissue. The relative non-selectivity ofconventional chemotherapy limits the dose that can bedelivered to tumours and can cause significant morbid-ity (and occasionally mortality) in patients. Therapy withsmall, targeted molecules, for example sunitinib, aims tosuppress pathways that promote tumour survival, but speci-ficity can be limited by the inhibition of multiple targets.The exquisite specificity of antibodies potentially over-comes this challenge and provides an ideal mechanism fortargeted cancer therapy. The ability to produce antibod-ies with a single specificity, that is, monoclonal antibod-ies (mAbs), has produced a revolution in cancer therapy.Using hybridoma technology, antibody libraries, or trans-genic mice, high-affinity antibodies can be generated againstan extensive range of targets. mAb therapy can disruptcancer cells using a variety of mechanisms. An mAb cantarget a growth factor or its receptor, initiate an immuno-logical assault, activate apoptosis, or deliver a cytotoxicpayload such as a radioisotope. Furthermore, the physicalcharacteristics of mAb-based molecules can be extensivelymodified so that therapeutics can be designed to meet spe-cific clinical requirements. Several antibody-based therapiesare now licensed to treat haematological or solid tumours(Table 1).