Table 1 In- and exclusion criteria for treatment with imatinib

- Male or female aged ≥18 years;

- Histologically proven adenocarcinoma of the colon;

- Completed cancer staging with CT-abdomen and CT-thorax/X-thorax according to hospital’s standard of care;

- Confirmed eligibility for surgery with curative intent as deemed by the hospital’s multidisciplinary board review;

- Test positive for CMS4 subtype;

- ≥4 properly stored pre-treatment biopsies for gene expression analysis/ELISA;

- WHO performance status 0 or 1;

- Adequate haematology status and organ function (defined as: normal creatinine clearance (≥60 ml/min (MDRD)), ALAT within 2.5× upper limit of normal (ULN), PT-INR < 1.5, leukocytes >1,5*10^9/L, Hb > 6.0 mmol/L, platelets >100*10^9/L);

- Willingness and ability to comply with scheduled visits, treatment plans and laboratory tests;

- Provision of written informed consent.

- The presence of synchronous distant metastases;

- Current hospital standard of care dictates that subject should undergo any neoadjuvant therapy;

- Concurrent participation in another clinical trial using any medicinal product, or participation in such a trial in the period of three months prior to the current trial;

- Women who are pregnant, plan to become pregnant or are lactating during the study or for up to 30 days after the last dose of imatinib;

- Known HIV or Hepatitis B/C infection;

- Known symptomatic congestive heart failure;

- Co-morbidity requiring concomitant treatment with drugs that act as strong inducers of CYP3A4 or with drugs with a narrow therapeutic range influenced by imatinib.