Pallavi Goorah
Advertising

Lowe wins Apollo Hospitals business

The company had short-listed O&M as well

Apollo Hospital Enterprises, which has more than 37 hospitals to its name, has awarded its creative business to Lowe. While industry sources have confirmed the development, neither the company, nor the agency were ready to comment on the issue.

The spends on the account is estimated to be the region of Rs 7 crore. Even Ratan Jalan, CEO, Apollo Hospital Enterprises, wasn't available for comments. Perhaps, the company has chosen to be tight-lipped because a formal contract is yet to be signed.

The first round of presentations, strategy and creative-led, happened around two weeks back. The agencies that participated included McCann-Erickson, Mudra, O&M and Lowe. The last two agencies were short-listed for the account.

The company apparently decided to appoint Lowe only on Saturday last.

The presentations revolved around Apollo’s current positioning in the healthcare arena, and the nature of communication in future, with regard to preventive healthcare.

As per media reports, Apollo Hospitals, in 2002, had set aside Rs 4 crore on preventive healthcare communication and in marketing its clinics better. The ad spends have been significantly enhanced since.

India is the most touted healthcare destination for countries such as South-East Asia, Middle East, Africa, Mauritius, Tanzania, Bangladesh and Yemen with 12 per cent patient inflow from developing countries.

The company's reputation extends beyond Indian shores. It has partnerships with hospitals in Kuwait, Sri Lanka and Nigeria.

Apollo is steadily making progress in the field of medical tourism and developing methodologies to attract foreign patients. The first international Apollo Health and Lifestyle Ltd (AHLL) clinic was opened at Doha just this year. The move is another initiative in developing medical tourism because these international clinics will be telemedicine and information centers in international markets.

In the brand building arena, the healthcare major has taken on steps such as entering into a a tie-up with Sita, to launch a jointly developed project, Sita Care, which will market hospitals packages abroad. The hospital chain has the distinction of being given the highest ratings by accredit ion agencies like ISO and Crisil. © 2005 agencyfaqs!

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