E-Care: Revolution or Evolution
Mike Alderette from the healthcare consulting division of IBM talked about the changes in today's paramedical environment. His fundamental thesis was that the practitioner will no longer be " the center of the universe" but rather that patient demands will drive health care in the future, particularly when the baby boomers age another decade and begin to accelerate this trend.
He believes that healthcare delivery is inherently inefficient in the USA and is therefore ripe for sweeping change. Pilots use the term "square corner" to describe the situation when one runs out of both ideas and experience at the same time. Mr. Alderette believes that many health care executives are in a square corner now! By way of comparison, he noted that Schwab nearly eliminated traditional brokers by allowing consumers to trade stocks themselves using the power of the Internet. Priceline simultaneously increased airline and hotel capacity rates and created a new class of consumer bargains for last-minute purchases.
Even though the e-business cycle is not as predictable as the traditional business cycle that is familiar, Mr. Aldrette feels that there will be numerous opportunities for future success despite all these changes. He predicts that Business-to-Business [B2B] e-purchasing and consumer e-education will be growing sectors. To illustrate how much the business world has already changed, the healthcare consulting branch of IBM now accounts for 40% of their worldwide income.
He concluded by suggesting that in the future, it will no longer be the big companies who always gobble up the small ones. Instead, he believes it will be the fast-moving companies who eat the slower ones, regardless of their relative sizes.