INTRODUCTION
Hepatocelluar carcinoma (HCC) is a serious health problem that has been neglected until recently. During the past decades, the heavy burden of viral hepatitis C as well as the growing importance of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis have resulted in dramatic increases in HCC incidence in Western countries.[1] Sorafenib (compound 1a) is an oral multikinase inhibitor that blocks tumor cell proliferation and angiogenesis by targeting the serine=threonine kinases Raf-1=B-Raf and the tyrosine kinases (RTKs) of VEGFR -2=-3 and PDGFR-b. [2] It was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the treatment of advanced renal cell carcinoma in 2005[3] and hepatocelluar carcinoma in 2007.[4] Nowadays, several reports have documented the preparation of sorafenib (Scheme 1). The key step is the construction of the unsymmetrical urea moiety.
