CEO Today USA Awards

Today, honoring the family influence of his own father, Febbo is rapidly changing his own world, successfully steering one of healthcare tech’s most exciting companies. Under his guidance, OptimizeRx has seen its market cap grow from $27 million up to a high of $240 million. Their platform now reaches over 50% of the ambulatory market, enabling access to over 300,000 physicians through over 370 EHRs. And every day they’re advancing patient affordability and adherence. At the heart of OptimizeRx, connections are built between classically disparate parts of the pharma ecosphere—pieces of the care continuum that historically have had little to no points of contact. This is not a simple feat. To connect pharma with physicians, they’ve built a communication channel embedded in an unparalleled network of over 370 EHRs, which allows messaging to providers within the clinical workflow. They also provide engagement platforms that enable deeper digital care management and treatment education pathways, providing the kind of engagement tools that drive outcomes. For providers, they deliver patient-friendly, efficient messaging that helps connect the right patient with the right prescriptions and programs. And for patients, they make treatments more affordable and easier to use and adhere to. In other words, at a time when digital has never been more disruptive to healthcare, OptimizeRx is building new ways for all the parts of the care continuum to work together. Like a digital healthcare switchboard, the OptimizeRx platform serves as a connection conduit for the entire healthcare ecosystem, delivering the right message to the right place at the right time. And steering the development of the groundbreaking platform is Will Febbo, who serves as its lead connector. While he might credit his business sense to the influence of his upbringing, it takes a CEO capable of thinking outside the pill bottle to deliver these creative solutions. For that ability, he credits his mother. “My mother is an artist, and she really pushed us to always try to think differently about everything. Often technology is abstract and hard to relate to, but if you’re able to think about old tech problems in new ways, you can find new paths to understanding and benefiting from it. And that’s what we’re doing at OptimizeRx.” Febbo’s refusal to do things in a conventional way is reflected in the diversity found in the company. One example of this is Febbo’s president and chief strategy officer, Miriam Paramore, who was recently named a finalist of the She Powers Health™ award presented by Livongo, which recognized some of healthcare’s leading female figures. From top to bottom, the company has proven a commitment to embracing women in leadership. That means that as large swathes of healthcare struggles to promote female leaders, OptimizeRx has proven repeatedly its willingness to put the right women in the right jobs. Will Febbo Will Febbo grew up surrounded by the kind of corporate world changers that people read and write business books about. Will and his family spent much of his youth moving every few years as his father was scaling the corporate ladder at GE—the GE that was a breeding ground for juggernauts of industry and innovation. “My very early years of influence,” says Febbo, “were spent at family gatherings with people like Jack Welch, Bob Wright, and Glen Hiner. Their confidence, intensity and the level of impactful living they displayed, was always a major source of inspiration for me.” C E O O F O P T I M I Z E R X CEO Today USA Awards 2019 www.ceotodaymagazine.com - M I C H I G A N - 70