“H.I.S.-tory” by Vince Ciotti

© 2011 H.I.S. Professionals, LLC

Episode # 55:

The Origins

of Today’s

Vendors

End of the Beginning…• We’ve about reached the end of the beginning of the HIS industry:

– 1960s = Mainframe Systems: IBM and the “BUNCH” group– 1970s = Shared System Era: SMS, McAuto, GE Medinet, etc.– 1980s = Turnkey Mini Systems: HBO, DCC, SAI, JS Data, etc.– 1990s = PC Revolution: HMDS, CliniCom, Micro Healthsystems.

• So for a fitting ending to our story, we’re going to recount the fascinating origins of today’s leading HIS vendors, who pride themselves in their large client bases and impressive annual revenue figures, but who all started as humble as Walt Huff with that Four Phase minicomputer in his garage – or was it kitchen?

• To clear up that question (and maybe create some more), we’re once again soliciting help from HIS-talk readers who were there, or know how to reach these pioneers directly.

–

Know These People?• So just who are the pioneers we’re looking for?

The founders of today’s 13 leading HIS vendors, based on their 2011 annual revenue figures:- $3.2B = McKesson, née HBOC = Walt Huff, Bruce Barrington, & David Owens - $2.2B = Cerner, still run by Neal Patterson, co-founded with Cliff Illig- $1.7B (est) = Siemens, née SMS (I know Jim & Harvey’s story well enough!)- $1.4B = Allscripts, née Eclipsys, also founded by Harvey Wilson of SMS.- $1.2B = Epic. Gee, I have to wonder, just who was it who founded them? - $900M (est) - GE Healthcare, née IDX/PHAMIS: last week’s Malcolm Gleser- $545M = Meditech, still run after all these years by Antonino Papallardo- $353M = NextGen: new Opus & old Sphere financials by Florian Weiland - $174M = CPSI (Computer Products & Services Inc), founded by David Dye - $170M = QuadraMed, née Compucare, founded by Sheldon Dorenfest- $160M = Keane, parent giant by John Keane, but HIS div. built by Ray Paris - $110M = HMS (Healthcare Management Systems), founded by Givens &

Doss- $70M (est) = Healthland, formerly Dairyland, founded by Steve Klick

What Do We Want to Learn?• Would be fascinating to hear just what inspired each of these HIS-

tory heroes to stick their personal necks out and form a firm way back in time when the building an HIS was a daring long shot:– What was their education? How (ir)relevant their major?– What computer firm did they come from (besides IBM!?)– How did they ever grow so large (major acquisitions)?– What in the world are they doing now (if retired)?

• So, please, if you know any of these amazing forefathers of our biz and can conVince them to tell their story, please send me their contact info:• vciotti@hispros.com

• I’ll give you due credit/blame for your help, and we will all be the wiser!!

And The First HIS-tory Hero Is:• We’ll cover them in inverse order, as the smaller HIS vendors are

the simplest story to tell (McKesson’s vendor/product acquisitions alone might take 50 future episodes!), so that makes the first one:

• Healthland – nee Dairyland, founded by Steve Klick was back in 1980 when minis were king.

• And I have to start by giving credit to HIS guru Frank Poggio, an old friend of Steve’s, with whom he shared a love for the frozen arctic tundra of the upper-Midwest when Frank founded HMDS, the first PC-based HIS which we featured in an earlier HIS-tory episode.

• Frank put me in touch with Steve, who gave me a dump of fascinating trivia, and insisted I contact his sales guru, Mark Middendorf, for more details (now with McKesson’s Paragon).

Stay Tuned…• So next week, we start with Steve Klick’s fascinating tale of:

– He never really did write any agribusiness software/systems– How so many decisions they made were “mistakes” at first…– The two firms he acquired in two back-to-back phone calls!

• How he came up with that original name• How he grew the firm from a 1-man band

to over 300 hospital clients & employees• Why he’s still working 60 hours a week

with his son Brady on new start-ups!

• So, please, if you know any of these HIS pioneers like Steve, give me their contact info and I’ll try to get similar stories out of them:- vciotti@hispros.com

• Or have them call me at 505/466-4958 (no dots for we old-timers!)