Why VCCP Is Changing Cowry’s Offer And Brand

A decade after its launch, VCCP's global behavioural science consultancy Cowry is entering a new chapter. The business is dropping “Consulting” from its name and unveiling a new identity as it sharpens its focus on helping clients become more behaviourally intelligent in the age of AI.

The refreshed positioning reflects a wider shift taking place across the industry as brands race to integrate AI into everything from customer experience to synthetic research. But while AI may be increasingly capable of mimicking human interaction, Cowry believes the real competitive advantage lies in understanding the humans behind the data. Among the consultancy’s global client roster are Amazon, Tesco, Sky, Fidelity, British Gas, Coca-Cola, easyJet, Pfizer, Transport for London, and P&O Cruises.

Andrew Peake, CEO of VCCP in London, explains: “AI is increasingly used to simulate human interaction, but it does not understand how people think, feel or make decisions. Cowry’s solution is simple: to fuse their deep understanding of human behaviour with intelligent technology to improve efficiency and automate customer interactions for clients... By combining behavioural science, creativity and intelligent technology, we can help clients build brands, experiences and organisations that are both highly effective and deeply human.”

The offer will introduce services such as designing AI-centric capabilities including agentic AI research moderators, generative behavioural toolkits, and AI systems trained using behaviourally optimised conversational data for brands. These will be trained using optimised conversational data, alongside an expanded ecosystem of technology partners to enable rapidly learning systems and hyper-personalised digital interactions that adapt to behaviour in real time. To achieve this, Cowry has formed partnerships with Behamics, Idomoo, and CallMiner.

To unpack the thinking behind the rebrand and what it means for clients, Cowry chief product officer Raphy March spoke to us about the consultancy’s next chapter.

Creative Salon: Why introduce this evolution of Cowry and why drop consulting?

Raphy March: There are two clear reasons behind this shift. The first is what’s happening in the market. AI is transforming how organisations operate, but there’s a growing gap between intelligent systems and real human behaviour. Businesses are investing heavily in technology, but not enough in understanding how people actually think, feel and make decisions within those systems. Closing that gap is where we play. The second is how our role has evolved. Increasingly, we’re not just advising on change, we’re building it; designing systems, tools and AI that shape behaviour in real time. 

Dropping ‘Consulting’ reflects both our brand and our direction. Clients already call us Cowry, and often refer to work as being ‘Cowryfied’, which says a lot about how distinctive our approach has become. More importantly, it signals a move away from being seen purely as advisors, towards creating behaviourally intelligent systems that deliver impact at scale.

Creative Salon: Can you talk about the role of AI/synthetic research being introduced as a new service and whether you plan for direct human research to continue to be a contributing factor?

One of the key drivers behind this shift is the ability to scale human understanding, not replace it. This is absolutely an expansion of what we do. Human research remains fundamental, particularly when it comes to emotion, nuance and context. What AI enables is the ability to take that understanding further, to explore more scenarios, test more ideas, and move at a completely different speed. The future isn’t synthetic versus human. It’s combining both to get closer to how people actually think and behave.

With Cowry’s significant reputation built over the last decade - how careful has the agency been in changing or evolving the offer?

This has been a very deliberate evolution, not a reinvention. We’ve always been at the forefront of behavioural science. From day one, we’ve had behavioural data scientists in the team and were one of the first to establish neurodesign as a core discipline. We’ve consistently challenged clients to think differently and work behaviourally, often partnering with early adopters of behavioural science. What’s changed is the context around us. The challenges our clients face haven’t fundamentally shifted, whether it’s digital adoption, platform migration or behaviour change at scale. What has changed is the systems those behaviours sit within. Today, AI is the biggest adoption barrier. Organisations are investing heavily in intelligent systems, but people don’t automatically understand, trust or engage with them. Behavioural science is still the answer, but now we can apply it faster and more precisely by combining it with AI and data. So this isn’t about changing who we are, it’s about evolving from behavioural science to behavioural intelligence, and scaling what we’ve always done in a more powerful way.

How did you go about identifying the new partners?

Another key part of this shift is building an ecosystem that can deliver behavioural intelligence at scale. We didn’t start with the technology, we started with behaviour. The question was where AI could genuinely improve how people make decisions and how experiences adapt in real time. From there, we identified partners whose technology could deliver against that, including Behamics, Idomoo, and CallMiner. They enable real-time, scalable interaction, which allows us to move towards true micro-personalisation, creating experiences that are tailored to individuals in the moment, based on how they think, feel and behave. Crucially, this isn’t about blanket personalisation or being overly intrusive. It’s about designing interactions that feel relevant, timely and genuinely helpful, strengthening relationships rather than disrupting them. Ultimately, it’s about creating systems that continuously learn, adapt and respond in a way that feels human.

You’ve already been working with clients on this offer - did they request more use of AI - what are you hearing from clients in terms of synthetic research?

Client demand is a major reason this space is accelerating. There’s a clear appetite to move faster, test more, and scale insight, but also a real concern about losing the human nuance that makes research meaningful. What we’re seeing is a shift towards behaviourally grounded simulation. For example, with EasyJet we simulated over 10,000 flight scenarios to understand and predict both customer experience and purchase behaviour, using models built on real customer data and implicit behavioural signals. That allows us to explore how different experiences, communications and moments in the journey influence decisions, not just whether someone buys, but how they feel and engage throughout. That’s very different from purely synthetic research. It’s not AI guessing, it’s AI learning from real behaviour and then scaling that understanding. That’s where clients are seeing real value and confidence.

For any marketers who are still wary of synthetic research what would be your message?

The final piece is using AI responsibly and intelligently. The caution around synthetic research is justified. On its own, it can oversimplify behaviour, reinforce bias, and create a false sense of certainty. But equally, brands that rely on research alone will struggle to keep up. Customers are increasingly expecting more personalised experiences, and true personalisation isn’t just about data, it’s about making people feel seen, understood and valued. The real opportunity lies in combining synthetic approaches with behavioural science and real human data. That’s what allows you to capture behaviour at scale while still understanding individual nuance. Synthetic research on its own won’t capture human behaviour. It has to be grounded in real data and behavioural science to be meaningful. Ultimately, the brands that will win won’t be the ones using the most AI, they’ll be the ones using it most intelligently.

Main Image: Back row Left to Right is Ziba Goddard (CEO), Raphy March (Chief Product Officer), Pippa Pennycook (Operations Director), Simon Binge (Commercial Director)

• Front row Left to Right is Krisztian Komandi (Behavioural Director), Natalia Gomez (Lead Behavioural Researcher), Richard Milner (Lead Behavioural Designer), Charlie Nixon (Lead Behavioural Architect)