NEW YORK – Avenue A/Razorfish, a digital advertising and services agency, is set to announce plans to launch a media and entertainment consulting practice, banking on business from traditional media companies that are trying to broaden their image.

A unit of Microsoft Corp, Avenue A/Razorfish is one of the largest interactive advertising and marketing agencies, boasting a client list that includes Molson Coors Brewing Co , Kraft Foods Inc, McDonald's and Starwood Hotels.

In an interview, Domenic Venuto, who will lead the media and entertainment practice, said an economic downturn that has hurt companies by cutting into advertising spending may work in his favor.

“As the pressure increases on traditional media companies, it's a great opportunity for us,” he said. “We definitely have a very strong point of view of how to shore up your traditional business, but also expand online. We've shown success, increasing page views and driving traffic.”

The practice will involve roughly 200 staffers in offices in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco as well as smaller groups in Germany, the United Kingdom and Australia. He declined to discuss revenue targets for the group.

Over the last several years, Avenue A/Razorfish has quietly been building its resume of work for companies in media and entertainment, ranging from print publishers to TV news networks, which are trying to build or improve their websites.

Recent projects have included work for Time Warner's CNN, Conde Nast and The New York Times. It has between 15 and 20 clients.

Now Avenue A/Razorfish wants to formalize the entertainment and media practice, rolling out the consultancy to companies based in the United States or abroad. It has recently worked with Brazil-based Terra Networks, HT Media in India and The Financial Times in the United Kingdom.

Avenue A/Razorfish expects to formally announce the practice later Thursday.

The launch of the practice comes as media companies still have not figured out how to keep pace with big changes in how audiences get their information and entertainment-reading news on the Web, for instance, rather than in a newspaper.

“It's not like we're reprimanding them,” said Venuto. “A lot of them are doing the right things and we're helping them along that path. We're helping them with the jump from old media to new media.”

He said projects typically take between three and nine months to complete, and could include work on a single website or a broader digital strategy. Either way, it boils down to clients looking for ways to keep pace with advertisers and audiences moving to newer media.

“We've had a Canadian media company come and talk to us and say 'We want to build our web revenue from $20 million to $100 million.' Those are the sort of questions we're getting,” he said.

Avenue A/Razorfish is part of the aQuantive online marketing company, which was bought last year by Microsoft for $6 billion during a frenzied stretch when digital agencies were being scooped up. Just prior to the deal for aQuantive, Google Inc agreed to buy DoubleClick Inc for $3.1 billion.

Since that deal, Microsoft has pursued Yahoo in an attempt to bolster its digital services as it faces off against Google.

Venuto said the Microsoft deal “brought a different level of access that we didn't have before” but that Avenue A/Razorfish has built its client roster independently.

“We've gotten to this position in our own right,” he said.

(Reporting by Paul Thomasch; editing by Carol Bishopric)