A Network Built
for Connection
For a family awaiting a medical breakthrough, every day matters. Even when the science for a new therapy is ready, the journey from discovery, through trials, to commercial availability takes years. Years that some families can't afford. What if we could dramatically simplify that journey? Think of all of the lives that would be impacted if we could build a tool that accelerates that journey. Not by weeks or months, but by three years.
To meet this urgent human need, a global CDMO undertook the immense task of integrating its dozens of specialized sites across the world. The goal was to create a unified engine for pharmaceutical progress, empowering drug makers to move with unprecedented speed. But to achieve this worthy goal, the global CDMO couldn't just execute the integration, they would need to do more.
The CDMO needed to shift the market’s perception. They needed those who could best take advantage of what they were building to stop thinking of them as a portfolio of individual sites and instead understand them as a singular, strategically engineered capability.
vividlab• results guided a visual emphasis on networks
Wanting fresh ideas and great execution, the organization turned to longtime partner DEFINITE•, tasking the video-first creatives with developing an Identity Spot that would introduce the network's value in a way that was emotionally resonant.
This project was about framing complexity.
How do we pitch a global tool made up of hundreds of capabilities and thousands of people as simple, impactful, and relevant?
definite• quickly discovered that the challenge this project posed was about framing complexity. How do we pitch our client's offering, a global tool made up of hundreds of capabilities and thousands of people, as simple, as impactful, as relevant. As we worked through our vividlab• process, leading fact-finding conversations in the client's C-Suite and with key sites across three continents, we surfaced a simple yet profound idea: networks are everywhere. We see them in nature, in our communities, in the infrastructure of modern life. They are the basic organization of our social existence. They are the fundamental architecture of progress.
We realized that to make the client’s achievement tangible, we needed to connect their highly specialized system to this universal concept. We needed to first connect the audience to the beauty and power of the networks they were already a part of, and only then would we make the connection to the client's new network and it's potential contributions to human health.
With an exciting narrative strategy in place, DEFINITE• turned to its founder, award-winning writer-director Kyle Johnson to helm the project. His credits include films for the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, Harvard University, the Library of Congress, the Royal Danish Academy of Music, Seoul Institute for the Arts, the Qualcomm Institute, all based on innovative aesthetic approaches developed during his PhD on multimedia communications. He leveraged an international team of collaborator to complete shooting across eight sites in three countries.
The screenplay, delivered by a warm and authoritative voiceover, acts as the narrative's central guide. The language was intentionally crafted to be simple, clear, and evocative, avoiding industry jargon in favor of universal ideas. The script begins with a poetic reflection on the networks that shape our lives, using words like "kinships" and "alliances" to build an immediate emotional connection. As the piece progresses, subtle emphasis is shifted to "engineered," "designed", and "built" in order to anchor the viewer to the core message of intentional integration.
vividlab• results guided a visual emphasis on networks
The film's visual language was designed to be kinetic and propulsive, always building the connection between the familiar and the new. Johnson’s team led the client's staff, not professional actors, through complex shoot days which resulted in dynamic, life-like imagery of medicine making in-progress. These powerful images beautifully contrast with intimate images family life, making the connection between the global CDMO's work and real life impact strikingly visual.
To visualize the concept of the network, DEFINITE•’s motion graphics team designed a symbolic language that extended the client’s existing brand identity. Colorful animated dots and lines gracefully overlay footage, at first tracing the connections in nature and society, and then mapping the client’s global infrastructure. This graphic system acts as a visual thread, making the abstract idea of a network concrete. It connects the world everyone knows to the specific, powerful world the client built, turning a complex operational reality into an elegant and intuitive visual.
vividlab• results guided a visual emphasis on networks
The resulting film, We built a network., was a resounding success. It provided the client with a powerful, versatile asset to articulate their integrated identity to the market, their customers, and their own global team. This success was validated externally when the film was honored with a Gold Telly Award in 2025, one of the industry's most sought after awards for video and television.
Our clients are building the future, and our job is to help them articulate that vision with clarity and passion.
The film served as a defining document, not just telling the client’s story to the world but helping to crystallize it for themselves. It gave a powerful, human voice to a complex operational reality, transforming an abstract business capability into a tangible mission.
Johnson, when receiving the Gold Telly for DEFINITE•'s work on this project, noted a deep connection between the film and the scientific it took as its subject. “Our clients are building the future, and our job is to help them articulate that vision with clarity and passion,” he says. “Collaborating with a team so dedicated to improving lives was a privilege. It wasn't always easy, coordinating intense work between California, New York, Frankfurt, and Milan, but in the end it's something we're all incredibly proud of. And the pasta was fantastic."
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