Publicis castoffs, reborn as Amplity, look to add comms, data insights to lineup

Back in October, Publicis put its outsourced sales rep and call center businesses up for sale in the wake of a dismal financial performance. Now, that group of businesses is back with a new look—and some new backing, too.

In the hands of Altamont Capital Partners, which snapped them up from Publicis, the businesses rebranded in late May to Amplity Health. The new-look company describes itself as a “pure-play pharmaceutical commercialization business” offering services for life sciences companies of all stripes. 

RELATED: Sales units for sale: Publicis to hive off contract pharma rep and call center groups

While Publicis may not have been interested in keeping the businesses around, they turned out to be what Altamont was looking for, Amplity CEO Mike Griffith said.

“The reason we bought these assets isn’t because we think they’re done,” he said. “They do have critical mass, they have a scale that we liked, we like the space—but we need to make a pretty significant investment to put more tools in the toolbox.”

To that end, medical communications, more data-based analytical insights and pricing and market access are “among the capabilities that we really want to add,” Griffith said.

While those types of changes are on the horizon, Amplity won’t be bidding a complete farewell to its time with Publicis. Sixty-nine Publicis staff came over to Amplity, and the new company intends “to continue to cooperate with Publicis,” Griffith said.

“We pitch together. We’ve still had a couple, since we carved out the business, where we cooperated with them, pitched together, put proposals together. There is a fair amount of synergy between capabilities.

“Particularly with the clients that were already working with both, when they bring that next idea forward, it’s pretty useful to have the same team,” he added.

But of course, if Amplity can snap up a medical communications agency, the two may eventually become competitors.

“As we grow, we’ll start to bump into each other a little bit,” Griffith said. But at least for now, “they don’t seem overly worried about it,” he joked.