Healthline’s makeover attracts more capital, content

Healthline Networks, an upstart San Francisco-based health-care search engine and web portal company, says it’s gaining ground on industry leaders in the health search arena.

This week Healthline enhanced its offerings by adding “drug search capabilities” that let consumers research pharmaceuticals, identify drug interaction issues, and study options such as medicinal herbs and supplements. It’s also adding new content from Yardley, Pa.-based StayWell, which will provide articles, tools and quizzes for the site.

The 9-year-old company, which rebranded and retooled in 2006, has raised $35 million in capital since late 2005, including $21 million last summer, and in recent months has roughly doubled its monthly portal visitors to 15 million. Revenue doubled last year, and is expected to double again this year, says Chairman and CEO West Shell III, although he declines to provide specifics. A spokeswoman admits the company’s made more progress in signing partnerships and attracting web visitors than generating revenue so far; much of its business comes from providing the technology behind other health search engines and portals.

“We’ve got lots of money in the bank and we’re launching a major search platform for Aetna,” Shell adds, on top of the drug-search step he calls “a very significant platform enhancement.”

This entry was posted on 19. February 2008 at 10:22 and is filed under consumer-driven, medical. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.