In its quarterly earnings release earlier this month, Oracle Corporation reported its second-quarter 2023 results, indicating that “revenue increased 18% year-over-year in US dollars and 25% in constant currency to $12,300.” millions”. This is an amazing achievement, especially against the backdrop of economic uncertainty and recessionary headwinds. Notably, Cerner contributed $1.5 billion to total revenue, marking it as a significant source of sustainable earnings.
Cerner is a leading electronic health records (EHR) company, with a wide variety of offerings and services in the data and healthcare management space. Late last year, Oracle bought Cerner for nearly $28 billion, an amount that was cautiously celebrated and praised. For many, the price tag was incredibly high.
But Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison was clear in his vision for the purchase: “Working together, Cerner and Oracle have the ability to transform healthcare delivery by providing medical professionals with better information, enabling them to make better treatment decisions that result in better outcomes for patients.
In this month’s press release, Ellison was equally emphatic about his goals and vision for Cerner and Oracle’s overall progress in healthcare. He explained: “Since the acquisition, Cerner has contributed to the growth of Oracle, and Oracle has helped Cerner improve its technology […] But we are just beginning our mission to modernize healthcare information systems. In the wake of the pandemic of COVID, there is a global sense of urgency to transform and improve national health systems.Our goals are ambitious: to fully automate clinical trials to shorten the time it takes to deliver new life-saving medicines to patients, enable Provide doctors with easy access to better information that leads to better patient outcomes, and provide public health professionals with an early warning system that locates and identifies new pathogens in time to prevent the next pandemic.The scale of this opportunity is not precedents, as well as the responsibility that accompanies it.
The entire tech industry wants a piece of the digital health and health information landscape, as healthcare increasingly turns to innovation to solve some of its toughest problems. Grassroots technology companies like Cerner provide strong value, not only in terms of advanced data and information management to enable better clinical care, but also in their ability to constantly innovate.
Other tech giants, similar to Oracle, have started to take advantage of this opportunity. Take, for example, Google, which continues to deliver an incredibly diverse set of healthcare technology solutions. The company’s latest initiative with Google Cloud Healthcare Data Engine is poised to become one of the strongest forces in healthcare data management and will undoubtedly be a game changer.
In particular, smaller organizations are also working to innovate in this space, from startups to boutique analytics shops. These organizations are leveraging unique data and insights to enable better clinical outcomes. Take, for example, Komodo Health. The company has leveraged its technology to create its Healthcare Map software, which provides a survey of “330 million patients, 15 million new daily clinical encounters, and 150 million complete payer profiles.” This implies “a 75% overlap across 350 hospitals and a 96% overlap across 11 billion laboratory records [giving] unparalleled insight into the patient journey.”
Another notable company is Flatiron Health, which has built a strong portfolio of services and technology focused on oncology, life sciences, and hospital systems. The company has grown tremendously in recent years, leveraging insights from “More than 3 million available patient records,” of which “75% are from community practices, [and] 25% are from academic cancer centers” .
Therefore, it is evident that this space is fast becoming one of the most sought-after opportunities for technology companies and organizations worldwide. The next decade will undoubtedly see many more companies investing and innovating in this field. Technology experts and healthcare organizations will be challenged to embrace this innovation to not only remain relevant, but also to better serve their communities.