Paolo Comoglio has a long and distinguished record in the field of research on tyrosine kinase receptors and related oncogenes . He developed the first anti‐phosphotyrosine antibody; through this tool he identified the kinases encoded by oncogenes such as ABL, MET, RON and ROR. Paolo Comoglio expounded and introduced a number of insights that are now largely accepted and widespread, notably the concept of ‘invasive growth’, a genetic program -driven by MET- otherwise ‘physiological’ but ‘usurped’ by cancer cells to progress toward metastasis. The program includes hypoxia, promoting tumor invasiveness, and venous thrombosis, a long‐sought link between cancer and thrombo‐embolism. He recently discovered that MET inhibition overcomes radiation resistance of glioblastoma stem cells and that withdrawal of therapeutic tyrosine kinase inhibitors accelerates disease progression by unleashing the ‘flare effect’. The invasive growth program is now under investigation in a previously unrecognize syndrome known as CUP (Cancer of unknown primary).