Diagnosis confirmed: Oracle has a case of healthcare cravings, bought Cerner for $28.3bn as the cure

Rumours that Oracle planned to buy healthcare software concern Cerner have proven correct. A joint statement from the two companies today announced the deal and valued it at $28.3B through an all-cash tender offer for $95.00 per share, immediately accreditive to Oracle’s earnings as a non-GAAP earning. Oracle’s executive veep …

[Steve K]

Voice Digital Assistant

I may not be up-to-date with professional Voice Software, but the use of a "Voice Digital Assistant" in a clinical context fills me with horror.

Alexa/Google Assistant/Sir/etc. are clever, but definitely not fool-proof.

If a clinician has to check their work because the voice assistant is not 100% guaranteed-reliable then where is the time-saving?

(I do realise that in the NHS, doctors dictate their letters, which are then submitted to their outsourced medical transcribers (offshore - e.g. India) so presumably they still have to proof-read letters and correct them in the current system)

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: Voice Digital Assistant

In my local GP's surgery they type their own notes. I'm not sure if they'd always wish the patient to hear what they say. In any event "Only the uaser interface will change" is not what the user usually wants to read unless the original was really bad. It seems to be a basic law of computing that big UI changes are always for the worse.

I suspect one other thing will change: licensing.

[David 132]

Re: Voice Digital Assistant

Well, Oracle are well known for charging an arm and a leg for their products...

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Voice Digital Assistant

Once they have them by the balls.....

[ICL1900-G3]

Re: Voice Digital Assistant

What is a GP's surgery? I vaguely remember something like that.

[Robert Grant]

The finest cloud revenue money can buy

But yes, it does make sense.

I'm hoping that disruption will happen here. There is insane lock-in with these systems and, well. I've been to one of the giant Cerner campuses in Kansas City. They are making a lot of money from healthcare.

[Anonymous Coward]

Health insurance & healthcare in one company

What could go wrong there for the consumer?

[Uncle Ron]

Lots Can (and will) Go Wrong

I see nothing in this but endlessly increasing costs for patients, providers, insurance companies--basically everybody. Healthcare in the US is the largest single industry on EARTH. Not just the US, but on EARTH. Voice interface? HAHAHAHAHAHA. Has anything from Oracle ever saved you money? This combine should be stopped.

[Sam Haine]

Southampton

University Hospitals Southampton NHS Foundation Trust owns its own EHR system.

UHSdigital CHARTS

[Anonymous Coward]

An excellent example

Of why mega corporation acquisitions need to be stopped.

The merger makes all the sense in the world . . . for Oracle and Cerner. Investors and executives will be happy.

But the ultimate result is that competition suffers and oligopolies grow.

For too long mega corporations have been allowed to buy up smaller firms and vanish them into their monolith. And the end result is rarely good for the end users or society, Prices go up, jobs go down, and innovation is stifled.

[Anonymous Coward]

Oi! I remember using PowerChart (one of Cerner's medical products) in the late 90s. I remember it was an impressive piece of kit ... if you didn't install a newer version of MS Access and break it. It seems that PowerChart depended on a specific MSJet.dll to make it function, and if you put a newer one in place, it would not even load. All to replace a terminal based application (running on a VAX) because it looked 'dated'. Okay, there may have been some Y2K concerns, too.

I also recall that the system was so power hungry, both front end computers and back end servers had to be upgraded to handle it, with some additional extensive Citrix magic required as well. IDK what the budget was, but I remember overhearing that they doubled it. I'm sure Oracle could get away with tripling it or better.