Razorfish Health launches

March 10, 2010 – 9:43 am by Chris

Spring is in the air, and of course that means another healthcare agency has sprung into fruition: Razorfish Health, the vertical healthcare practice of the digital agency Razorfish.

I had wondered, since Publicis acquired Razorfish last year from Microsoft for $530 million, if something like this was going to happen. Razorfish’s health practice had been growing and my initial supposition was that with the acquisition, Publicis was going to fold Razorfish’s digital health practice into Digitas Health (Publicis owns Digitas, Digitas Health’s parent). But Razorfish and Publicis executives believed that the network could support two digital health agencies, according to Katy Thorbahn, senior VP, general manager, Razorfish Health.

According to Ms. Thorbahn, the impetus to separate out the healthcare business of Razorfish came last spring, when Razorfish had a change in leadership. Clark Kokich, who was CEO, moved to the chairman role, Bob Lord took over as CEO, and Dave Friedman took on the role as president of the Americas.

“As we were going through that change, Bob and Dave started to step back and look at the Razorfish business overall, and started to think about how do we think, as a brand, we can drive the most growth for our business overall and deliver the best work for our clients,” Ms. Thorbahn says. “When we took a look at that, and looked specifically at the amount of healthcare expertise we had built up, specifically in Philadelphia but also throughout the business, and started to think about the questions that clients were coming to ask us about, and the challenges that they were raising for us to solve … the landscape was pointing towards the fact that this was probably a really good time for us to verticalize the business under health.

“This enables us to make some different decisions around investment strategies, and talent, and all of those things to put forth a world-class digital healthcare agency, to turn loose the power of Razorfish onto that space. And ultimately, the reason that we did that was we believed that it will not only result in more innovative and business-building work for our clients, but also do the same for our business.”

When Razorfish was acquired by Publicis, the senior leadership there agreed that Razorfish Health should be separated out from Razorfish. “They [Publicis leaders] felt very excited about it and of course they’ve had some really great success in the healthcare space and felt that there was definitely some room for another strong player like us,” Mr. Thorbahn says. “Hence we got the go-forward from all the way up to Maurice [Levy, CEO of Publicis] and everyone else to stay focused on this.”

Razorfish Health is in no way a “conflict shop” for Digitas Health, Ms. Thorbahn says.

“Instead, what we’re trying to do is hold a distinct offering under the Razorfish brand for those clients who are gravitating more towards the types of things where we focus and where we bring into the market,” she says. “So for example, if you think about Razorfish, there’s a reason why we’re Razorfish Health – we’re very much growing out of the Razorfish brand and the business. Our goal there is to create experiences for our clients that build their business, and so we’re very much focused within the digital space and putting digital very much front and center and at our core, and looking at how, through insights, that we can glean about the end customer – whether that’s patient, whether that’s physician, whether that’s pharmacist – and how do we best use digital for our client’s advantage.

“That’s a little bit different than if you look at what Digitas Health is doing, where their scope right now is a bit larger, beyond that. Obviously they’re very much digital at their core, but they’re also handling more traditional work as well. In terms of how we’re working together, it’s really not that kind of a structure that we have set up, it’s more about how do we, under Publicis, have two really strong brands in the healthcare space that are digitally led and that have unique offerings for clients.”

Razorfish Health plans to be less specialized in some ways than sister agency Digitas Health, which has traditionally focused on pharma. “We obviously have a lot of pharma business, we believe that’s really important,” Ms. Thorbahn says. “But we’re also looking to be a little bit broader in healthcare, in terms of wellness brands, in terms of OTC, payors, and such.”

Another key differentiator between the two agencies is how they use digital. “Our goal there is to create experiences for our clients that build their business, and so we’re very much focused within the digital space, putting digital very much front and center and at our core,” Ms. Thorbahn says. “And looking at how, through insights, that we can glean about the end customer, whether that’s the patient, whether that’s the physician, whether that’s the pharmacist, on down the line – how do we best use digital for our client’s advantage. That’s a little bit different than if you look at what Digitas Health is doing, where their scope right now is a bit larger. Obviously they’re very much digital at their core, but they’re also handling more traditional work as well.”

According to Ms. Thorbahn, the agency has about 50 brand assignments, but due to nondisclosure agreements, can only list four clients on their Website: Aetna, the Alzheimer’s Association, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, and Genentech (Razorfish designed the latter’s Website, gene.com).

Razorfish Health will continue to headquartered in Philadelphia, out of the building on North Eighth Street and Willow that also houses Shampoo, a local nightclub. “It is sort of an entertaining part of the building, particularly if we’re there late in the evenings, we get to see if it’s goth night or teen night, or techno,” Ms. Thorbahn laughs. (Editor’s note: I fully confess to have sharked a Razorfish parking spot many a time when attending events at the club.)

Razorfish Health does have offices in New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, and is supporting work globally through London and Paris. But cool nightclub neighbor in Philly aside, “Long term, our goal is that Razorfish Health will have physical footprints elsewhere, both in the U.S .and globally,” Ms. Thorbahn says. “We’re going to expand our physical presence as we go along, as the business grows.”

You can check out Razorfish Health’s blog re:plenish here, and their live Twitter Health Conversation tracker here.