GE entered the healthcare IT industry in 1966 but exited in 1971, before reentering in the late 1990s through a series of acquisitions. This included buying IDX in 2005, making GE a top 4 vendor. However, GE began losing market share around 2010 as larger clients switched to Epic. A joint venture with Intermountain Healthcare also struggled. By 2013, GE had fallen in the vendor rankings and sold off parts of its portfolio, raising questions about whether it would fully exit healthcare IT again.

1. H.I.S.-tory
by Vince Ciotti
Episode #91: GE
Healthcare
Part 4
© 2013 by H.I.S. Professionals, LLC, all rights reserved.

2. The Oldest HIS Vendor?
• Thanks to Jim Pesce, VP over McKesson’s HIS products, we pick up
the story of how GE began its HIS ventures several years before
the three oldest current HIS vendors were founded back in 1969:
– Compucare, Shared Medical Systems, and Meditech.
• You may remember Dr. Octo Barnett’s early project at MIT that
was the HIS baptism for Meditech’s founder Neal Pappalardo.
Turns out, Jim Pesce joined GE Healthcare way back then too:
– “Actually started up in 1966. Was a start up funded by
Cambridge, MA based engineering firm Bolt Baranek and
Newman. They were building the internet for healthcare. The
technology couldn't support their vision. GE took over funding
at end of 1967. GE then sold the system to HCA in 1971 when
the entire team, except Pesce relocated to Nashville. The
system which was financials only is the home grown billing
system HCA still uses today... Imagine that!”

3. Sleeping Giant…
• In fact, HCA is not alone in using 1960s technology in 2013:
– Hundreds of hospitals still run Siemens “Invision,” with TCE
(Transmission & Control Error) reports from 1960’s SHAS.
– And hundreds more are still running Meditech’s “Magic,” with
roots that go back thru MIIS to Dr. Octo Barnett’s MUMPS…
• What’s germane to our HIS-tory is
GE got out of HIS in 1971, and
stayed out for several decades,
ending any claim to being one of
the oldest continuous HIS vendors.
• Then, in the late 90s, the sleeping
electronics giant re-entered the HIS
industry with a vengeance, using its
enormous capital assets to fund a
series of acquisitions of HIS firms.

4. Roaring Back, 20 Years Later
• As the time line below illustrates, once GE woke up in 1997, it
went on a buying binge, gobbling up a slew of niche players:
Company Acquired Date(New Name)
– Lockheed Martin/LORAL 1997 (Centricity PACS)
– Marquette Medical Systems 1998 (Centricity Perinatal)
– Per-Se RIS 2001 (Centricity RIS )
– iPath ORMIS 2002 (Centricity Perioperative)
– BDM 2002 (Centricity Pharmacy)
– MedicaLogic Logician 2002 (Centricity Physician Office EMR)
– Millbrook 2002 (Centricity Physician Office PM)
– TripleG 2003 (Centricity Lab)

5. The Net is CAST
• The biggest acquisition of all was was IDX in 2005, for $1.2B, who
had themselves acquired a full suite of hospital & ancillary systems,
all renamed as part of the PHAMIS “cast” series of product names.
• So GE renamed each with one of its own “Centricity” monikers:
IDX Name(GE Name)
Flowcast Centricity Business
Groupcast Centricity Group Mgmt.
Carecast Centricity Enterprise
Imagecast Centricity RIS-IC
• Most importantly, just like other acquisition-oriented firms such as
HBOC, Eclipsys, Allscripts, etc., GE set about integrating the most
important components of any HIS system: marketing material!
Vendor HQ sales mavens churn out “seamlessly” integrated:
– Brochures, PowerPoints, Proposals, Contracts, Invoices, etc.
• Some vendors even interface their disparate HIS acquisitions…

6. Impressive Financials
• Per the chart below, GE Healthcare grew nicely from these HIS
acquisitions, and adding IDX’s ≈$500M in annual revenue at the
time of the takeover made GE an overnight $1B+ HIS player!
– They suddenly ranked 4th behind McKesson, Siemens &Cerner
• GE could offer both “Total HIS” (financial, clinical & ancillaries) as
well as a full practice management suite (financial & clinicals).
• All under a fully integrated set of demos, proposals, ppt file, etc.
Like other acquiring vendors, these products ran on a way array of
hardware platforms, OS, data bases and programming languages…

7. Sales Stars
• To head up sales of their
red hot HIS division, GE
recruited Frank Pecaitis,
sales superstar during
QuadraMed’s halcyon
days of the 90s, who also
helped put MedSphere’s
“OpenVista” on the map.
• Here’s GE’s demo dudes &
dollies at our 2009 “HIS
Buyers Seminar” in Dallas:
• You name it, hospital or
practice system, and they
could present it – on a
seamlessly integrated ppt!

8. GE’s Apogee…
• By the end of the decade, GE
hit an estimated $1B+ in HIT
revenue from a large client
base of ≈100 hospitals and
over 1K physician groups.
• But then something happened
to GE as well as Horizon,
Soarian, Sunrise, Millennium,
etc. They ran upon an “epic”
competitor that dominated
the large AMC/IDN world...
• Frank left, revenues slacked,
and they not only lost large
hospital sales, but started to
lose many large Centricity
clients as well to Ms. Judy.

9. A “Caradigm” Shift
• There were high hopes for GE’s 2009 joint venture with IHC,
creators of “HELP” years ago. To quote the Salt Lake City Tribune:
– “In early 2009, General Electric announced a $3 billion
investment in new medical technology that involved a
partnership between GE Healthcare and Utah’s Intermountain
Healthcare to create a top-line electronic medical-record
system. The Web-based record system was designed to help
doctors and nurses avoid medical errors and waste, while also
creating an online record for patients.”
• Then, in March of this year came the surprise announcement:
– “Caradigm, a joint venture formed 10 months ago by GE
Healthcare and Microsoft, has laid off approximately 70
percent of its Utah workforce. The layoff, which took place on
Wednesday at the company’s office in Murray, affected
between 40 and 50 employees.”

10. Beginning of their 2nd Perigee?
• In our annual ranking of HIS vendors by annual revenue, we
estimate GE has fallen several positions since their post-IDX peak.
• They even sold their RX system back to BDM in March! Is it the
start of second retreat from the HIS biz? If I live long enough, I’ll
revisit this prediction in a 2023 HIS-talk HIS-tory episode on GE…
• Meanwhile, here’s the 47-year picture of GE’s HIS ups & downs: