drkoop.com gains 50 percent on caregiver deal

drkoop.com, Inc. (Nasdaq: KOOP) raced ahead 38 percent Tuesday, after a dose of financial care from webofcare.com incited buying of the rock-bottom stock.

The stock of the cash-strapped drkoop.com, up 31/32 to 2 3/4, or 54 percent, has been resuscitated from a flat-line which has scraped 1 in the recent months. The company in April warned it would report a much larger-than-expected first quarter loss on weak revenue, and said it had about five months of cash left.

On Tuesday, the company said it signed a two-year sponsorship agreement with webofcare.com, a virtual community for caregivers. The agreement includes a fixed sponsorship payment for drkoop.com, as well as a revenue-sharing agreement based on webofcare.com e-commerce offerings. Financial details of the sponsorship were not available.

As part of the deal, drkoop.com will create a new content center for caregivers featuring content from webofcare.com. This center will make drkoop.com the only healthcare portal able to provide online support to America's at-home caregivers. The new Caregiver Center will feature animated demonstrations of caregiving skills, such as feeding and diapering, along with reliable, up-to-date articles reviewed by webofcare.com's board of doctors, nurses and therapists. The Caregiver Center is expected to launch in mid-July.

"We chose drkoop.com because its content is highly credible, the brand image is compelling, and the site has tremendous traffic," said David Walters, president and CEO of webofcare.com in a statement.

drkoop.com's top competitors include Healtheon/WebMD (Nasdaq: HLTH) and OnHealth Network (Nasdaq: ONHN) according to Hoover's Online.