Ashfield and Huntsworth have unveiled Inizio, a new joint venture that combines both companies’ medical, marketing, advisory, communications and patient and stakeholder engagement offerings.

Inizio will act as a strategic partner for life sciences and healthcare companies throughout the drug product life cycle.

The new joint venture has five specialist business units that offer a range of capabilities, spanning landscape evaluation to loss of exclusivity.

The business units include Inizio Advisory, which aims to help pharma, biotech and life sciences companies in developing, executing and operationalising strategies across portfolio licensing and development, new product launches, established product and franchise strategy, HEOR, pricing and market access.

Inizio Medical offers a mix of complex scientific understanding and creativity to produce engaging content for healthcare communities.

Inizio MarComms, represented by Evoke, is a purpose-built global brand, experience and communications platform.

Inizio Engage partners with clients to develop tailored experiences and deliver improved treatment outcomes. This branch of Inizio is focused on creating impactful solutions across live, hybrid and digital channels for healthcare professionals, payers and patients.

Inizio Biotech covers clinical development and commercialisation, offering personalised and scalable solutions for its customers.

With operations in 35 countries and over 10,000 employees, along with scientific and strategic experts, Inizio supports its clients with market solutions in therapeutic areas.

Commenting on the launch, chief executive officer Paul Taaffe said: “We are excited to unveil Inizio to the market as we believe it’s time to reimagine health. From the moment we set out to bring Ashfield and Huntsworth together we knew we were combining a unique set of best-in-class capabilities.

“The creation of Inizio is a direct response to the increasingly complex landscape our clients navigate in terms of clinical development, product launch and commercialisation. Through Inizio they can access the specialist expertise and a partner that will help them to optimise the commercialisation of their products.”

Ryan Quigley, chief operating officer at Inizio added: “Whether we are enabling our clients to maximise value at a specific milestone, or acting as a guide throughout their journey, we seek to elevate their expectations of partnership and improve patient outcomes.”

Paul Taaffe

Ryan Quigley

Healthcare marketing communications, training and medical education agency, Guidemark Health, and strategic payer marketing agency, Cyan Health, have announced that both companies have rebranded as Lumanity.

The rebranding follows Lumanity’s acquisition of the two agencies in 2021.

As a company that has been working with international clients for over 30 years, Lumanity aims to deliver transformative outcomes in order to optimise access to medical advances.

Its central focus is to unite diverse scientific, clinical and functional knowledge to provide the biopharmaceutical industry with unique and impactful solutions to its development challenges, market access and commercialisation.

Jon Williams, CEO of Lumanity, said: “In the eight months that our colleagues from Guidemark and Cyan have been part of our organisation, they’ve brought creative thinking, fresh ideas and a collaborative spirit to Lumanity. We are excited to have them take on the Lumanity name and continue on this journey with us to transform the industry.”

Through the acquisition, Lumanity is able to bolster its capabilities by utilising the technology solutions and customer engagement expertise of Guidemark, as well as its indepth understanding of patient advocacy and HCP marketing communications, and combining this with Cyan’s extensive market access expertise.

Additionally, Lumanity will have access to Cyan’s experience in developing high-impact payer engagement strategies, along with the agency’s experience in launching and executing communication plans.

Sharing his thoughts on the rebranding, Michael Parisi, former CEO of Guidemark turned president of creative strategy and engagement at Lumanity, said: “We are proud to be part of this organisation and to officially adopt the Lumanity name. This marks an important step in strengthening our capabilities in oncology and rare diseases with the support of our global colleagues from across Lumanity.”

Speaking on behalf of Cyan, Amber Gilbert, former managing director of Cyan and now global president, market access at Lumanity, commented: “Accelerating access to medical advances for patients who need them has always been at the heart of what we do. As part of Lumanity we will continue to serve our clients as strategic thought partners, solving complex market access challenges to maximise potential for their brands. Working with our colleagues across Lumanity will result in greater, more integrated value for our clients.”

Jon Williams

Michael Parisi